Stalin’s War: A New History of World War II
by Sean McMeekin
Basic Books, 2021
831 pp.

The benefits of privatization are well documented by empirical studies, so they will not be rehashed in this piece. Yet many still assume that some commodities are beyond privatization. Too often proponents of privatization fail to appreciate that humans are sentimental characters, and as a result, they are unwilling to commodify resources deemed to be sacred.

The implementation of voter ID laws to prevent fraud has led some to argue that voting rights are under assault by the state. But this mistaken assumption is predicated on a false premise, because voting is not a right. Rights exist independent of the political regime, so even though communist states abrogate human rights, this does not alter the fact that people still have a right to own property and express religious beliefs.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN for short, does not seem to usually draw much attention in modern global media. This is despite the ASEAN having a total population bigger than that of the United States or even the entire European Union, and that the resources of its ten members combined make it one of the largest economies in the world.

In the American imagination, China is on course to overtake America as an economic superpower. Commentators and average Joes alike are mesmerized by China’s manufacturing prowess and the swift ascent of Alibaba. On the nativist right, the rise of China is so intimidating that many propose industrial policy as a tool to enhance domestic competitiveness. While the ascendance of China should not be underestimated, Americans are forgetting that China is still a laggard in technology.

O, my offense is rank, it smells to heaven,
It hath the primal eldest curse upon’t,
A brother’s murther!

–Hamlet, act 3, scene 3

Carl Menger (February 23, 1840–February 26, 1921) is the founder of the Austrian school of economics. He is generally recognized in economics for his contribution to the development of the concept of marginal utility and as a pioneer of the subjective value theory. For Austrian economics specifically, he laid the foundation with his insights on the use of knowledge and foresight, the importance of relative prices, the role of time, and the role of the spontaneous emergence of social institutions.

Prices Reflect Exchange Ratios

Prices, as Menger points out in his Grundsätze, emerge as an accidental phenomenon. They are not the essence of economic activity. Prices are fortuitous insofar as they are the unintended result of an economic exchange that has subjective evaluations as its basis. Prices do not determine the exchange, but rather the individual exchange valuations determine the limits within which a negotiated price in terms of exchange ratios will be agreed upon.

Pressure on the unvaccinated grows. While the vaccinated in some countries are getting back some of their freedoms taken away by the covid interventions, the unvaccinated are not so well off. They are being targeted for discrimination. Access to public spaces and traveling is being made more difficult for them. In some countries there is even mandatory vaccination for some professions.