President Donald Trump followed his announcement of steel and aluminum tariffs with a declaration that “trade wars are good, and easy to win” -- a stance economists and members of his own political party immediately challenged. Not long after the U.S. announced its tariffs, international trading partners threatened retaliatory fees against American goods such as bourbon, blue jeans and Harley-Davidson.
Socialists are jumping for joy due to the fact that a Mercatus Center study supposedly concluded that “Medicare for All” would save the nation $2 trillion over the span of ten years. This twist of the official report stems from Jacobin Magazine, an openly socialist publication when they claimed that Medicare for All will ultimately save money for the people.
In my article, “ The First Amendment Protects Dirt ,” I pointed out how ridiculous it is to think that Trump campaign officials and maybe even President Trump himself are in legal jeopardy because a group of Russians supposedly provided the officials with some political dirt about Hillary Clinton.
President Trump’s trade war doesn’t seem to be going well. Corporations have already left the United States, and our agricultural sector is already beginning to feel economic strain. However, despite these and potentially more disastrous consequences, the president’s actions are still receiving widespread support, and the cry among his supporters remains “trust Trump!”
Last week’s collapse of the Turkish lira has dominated the headlines, and it is widely reported that this and other emerging market currencies are in trouble because of the withdrawal of dollar liquidity. There are huge quantities of footloose dollars betting against these weak currencies, as well as commodities and gold, on the basis the long-expected squeeze on dollar liquidity is finally upon us.
With the possible exception of a few extreme environmentalists, everyone agrees that robust long-run growth is a key to a better society.
An electoral weakness for anyone who advocates more freedom—i.e., smaller government—is that such a position can be easily demagogued as a selfish threat to many voters. Their continued government benefits depend on the continuation of someone else being forced to pay for them, typically “the rich,” making any rollback in “coercive charity” almost impossible politically. Yet, ironically, the result of such demagoguery is counterproductive, because more freedom offers the best hope--and the only just one--for those struggling economically.
In 1958, Foundation for Economic Education guiding light, Leonard Read, presented a series of lectures in Argentina against the backdrop of an economy decimated by mis-government which shares a great deal with the same country six decades later. The lectures became a small book-- Why Not Try Freedom?—an excellent encapsulation of Read’s thought.
