Lynne Kiesling This year’s Economic Freedom of the World report is released today, and the US has dropped to #18, its lowest ranking ever. From the press release: The United States, long considered a champion of economic freedom among large industrial nations, dropped to its lowest position ever in to the Fraser Institute’s annual Economic …
Lynne Kiesling One of the themes of my collection of links on Friday was that economic liberties are civil liberties, that a dichotomy between them is a false one. Philosopher Aeon Skoble explains why in this short Learn Liberty video. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWAyEzyp2xQ&feature=player_embedded]
Lynne Kiesling Some arguments and ideas catching my eye this morning: At their Why Nations Fail blog this morning, Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson point out that central planning predates Marxist ideology historically, and is an instrument that political elites use to control and “extract resources from society”. At the Huffington Post, economist Ben Powell …
A few weeks ago President Obama made his now memorable “you didn’t build that” remark. Most of the resulting political exchange has been pretty thoughtless. Extremely rare have been the thoughtful reactions. Here are two of the best.
Michael Giberson Lynne’s post on early commerce in ice reminded me that ice making has made other appearances in economic history. For example, some U.S. states once required a state license to make and sell ice. The question of the reasonableness of such licensing requirements reached the Supreme Court in 1932 in New State Ice …
Lynne Kiesling Sarah’s post here on manners (including her Freeman essay and Matt Zwolinski’s BHL post) and Mike’s observations on them open up a great discussion about the importance of seemingly superficial informal norms for enabling us to live together and generate civil society. Mike’s absolutely right that the road to anarchy is paved with …
Michael Giberson Sarah’s essay on reading and sympathy, explicated a bit in her post here at KP on manners, and Matt Zwolinski’s near contemporaneous remarks on the same topic, recalled to me one of my favorite ideas: the road to anarchy is paved with good manners. I mean “anarchy” in a good way, of course: “anarchy” …
Sarah Skwire So Matt Zwolinski and I had a fun moment last week when we more or less simultaneously published on more or less the same topic. This either means that Matt and I need to get out more, or it means that we’re on to something. I’m going for the latter explanation. And all …
Lynne Kiesling [NOTE: The following is an economist’s musings about philosophy, so if my philosopher friends can flesh out my argument and identify errors I’d be grateful. Also, this post is meant for you if you are interested in electricity regulation, so don’t just mark it as read because it’s philosophy ;-)! –LK] Although I …
Michael Giberson “Get the prices right!” was the rallying cry of some economists in the aftermath of the break up of the Soviet Union. Don’t plan the transition, stop planning and let markets sort it out. Similar advice goes out to developing economies around the world. Don’t ease your way to liberalization, throw open the …
Adam Smith Opposes “Shock Therapy” for Developing and Transitioning Economies Read More »
Copyright © 2022 Knowledge Problem Archive