The friction or antagonism between the private and the public sphere was intensified from the first by the fact that. . .the state has been living on a revenue which was being produced in the private sphere for private purposes and had to be deflected from these purposes by political force. — Joseph A.
Ivan Katchanovski’s The Maidan Massacre in Ukraine: The Mass Killing That Changed the World offers the most detailed and empirically-grounded reconstruction of the events of February 2014 available in any language.
After weeks of bad omens, we finally have the autumn budget. Yes, it is as bad as predicted—more taxes, more spending, more empty promises. Nothing new or unexpected. The funny thing is that the government keeps claiming that they will deliver more growth and less inflation.
Until the Industrial Revolution came along, communities could only grow and thrive if they first managed to push agricultural productivity well beyond bare subsistence. Italy’s late-medieval and Renaissance ascent—from 1250 to the mid-16th century—demonstrates how a functioning rural economy could break the cycle of the chronic poverty that had shackled mankind for millennia.
[Radical Universalism: Beyond Identity by Omri Boehm (New York Review of Books, 2025; 192 pp.)]
A few days ago, cannabis stocks surged after news broke that President Donald Trump is considering ordering his administration to reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug, a move that would represent a significant shift in US policy.
Due to wartime inflation of bills of credit (“Continentals”) during the American war for independence and the predictable economic effects, an old American colloquialism developed, “not worth a Continental” (although this phrase may have come about much later than the Revolutionary era).
Many view Charles Dickens as the inventor of modern Christmas. This is largely due to his beloved 1843 novella A Christmas Carol. Given his association with the holiday, Christmas is an appropriate time to reassess the man. Rather than a kindhearted champion of the oppressed, Dickens was a monstrous villain who taught millions to hate capitalism.
I applaud the online magazine Slate for its recurring series on “the dismal science,” as they call it. Rather than boring discussions of the housing market or the NASDAQ index, economists such as Steven Landsburg and others tackle interesting issues. Don’t get me wrong, I just about always disagree with the columns.
