Mises Wire

Money really does buy happiness—up to a point. But at all income levels, happiness is very, very subjective.

With their bizarre and extreme lockdowns, governments are forcing very low-risk populations to endure social isolation and unemployment. The mental health effects will be significant.

After 2018, the US economy was already headed toward a recession. But bailouts and lockdowns have made things even worse.

Buyers and sellers in the free market do indeed act from self-interest, but Adam Smith never argued that this excludes friendly feelings for those they do business with.

For many parents, the ongoing closure of public schools will just reinforce growing suspicions that public schools just aren't worth it anymore. Maybe they never were.

Media outlets, both left and right, are mostly narrative driven. Also, journalists have a tendency to lazily reprint whatever "experts" say. This makes media reporting thoroughly unreliable.

Governments create nothing, and only excel at coercion and violence. This is why governments are enthusiastic about shutting down economies but seem unsure about how to open them.

Crashes are fast, like that first hill on a coaster. Recoveries are not, for the simple reason that production is more difficult than destruction.

The COVID-19 panic has provided a myriad of opportunities for politicians to exploit the fear and pain of ordinary people for personal profit.

The EU has now become essentially a makeshift, lawless regime designed to prop up bankrupt states. So much so, in fact, that even the German supreme court has become alarmed.