As we observe the current frenzy of lawyers preparing to sue McDonald's and Burger King—and even suing Kraft Foods, the maker of Oreos—for allegedly causing their clients to suffer from obesity, we cannot help but wonder what lunatics have taken over the U.S. legal system.
The measures of inequality on which analysts, policymakers, and armchair pundits typically lean may be misleading, argues Art Carden. Even when measures of real income tell us otherwise, the real differences in income and wealth generated by the free market may be much smaller today than they were 100, 50, and even 10 years ago. So maybe "inequality isn't growing fast enough" for some—it doesn't appear to be growing at all.
Allan Meltzer did not set out to encourage Americans to consider the unthinkable: the Fed is so dangerous to our economic and political health that it should go. But maybe, just maybe, his new but flawed book may reignite a debate that goes back to Jacksonian America. Gregory Bresiger is the reviewer.
Some commentators have tried to revitalize the old Keynesian idea of the liquidity trap. Although the trap itself follows from the J.R. Hicks IS-LM analysis, the basic idea is borrowed from J.M. Keynes. In fact, Japan has not been been in such a trap in the years following 1990, and the whole idea of the trap is gravely flawed.
This book frightens me. The authors do not confine themselves to a justification of the American invasion of Iraq,
The Fed has announced that it will turn its attention from fighting inflation to fighting deflation. There are serious problems with this approach, writes Frank Shostak. There is nothing wrong with lower prices, and if currency depreciation could improve economic conditions, poverty would have been eradicated a long time ago. In fact, pumping the money supply even more could lead to all round economic devastation.
In democratic societies, elected political officials are the final arbiters of the government's marketplace do's and don'ts. Who elects these political officials? Surprise! The same people supposedly incapable of making informed decisions in the marketplace.
The web and print publications overflow with ideas on what kind of country Iraq ought to be and what the U.S. should do to bring it about. But let us not forget that self-government is a first principle of freedom. That cannot be achieved so long as the U.S. military is there. The U.S. has done enough damage to this poor country. The proper U.S. plan for Iraq consists of one priority: get out!
The experience of "regime change" in Iraq raises fundamental questions about political economy and philosophy. For example, the looting and vandalizing that occurred after the military defeat of the Saddam Hussein government in Baghdad has been cited as proof of the necessity of a state. Hans Hoppe refutes the idea.
Shopping at a mall, joining a country club, or working for a business are not rights. Remember that before you get angry at not being able to stay at the mall, not being able to play golf at Augusta, or not getting hired because you don't look the part. In order for something to be taken from you or denied to you, it must be yours in the first place.
