A very good visual correlation between the yearly percentage change in the consumer price index (CPI) and the yearly percentage change in the price of oil seems to provide support to the popular thinking that future changes in price inflation in the US are likely to be set by the yearly growth rate in the price of oil (see chart).

But is it valid to suggest that a price of an important input such as oil is a key determinant of the prices of goods and services?

The division of labor allowed people like Mel Kiper Jr. create a niche doing what they love: writing football draft reports.

If nothing else, the Chinese have a sense of history and destiny. They have had a glorious past, stretching back millennia, and once controlled most of the Asian heartland in the days of Genghis and Kublai Khan. But even then, China was essentially inward-looking, protecting her own cultural values. Trade with Europeans in the centuries following Marco Polo’s visit was mostly at the behest of European travelers, not the Chinese. She exported her art and culture to visitors, and did not import European values.

This week ESPN announced they were laying off 100 on-screen personalities and writers, the latest round of staff cuts for the self-proclaimed Worldwide Leader in Sports. Some of the issues plaguing ESPN are obvious, they are first and foremost a cable channel at a time when Americans are increasingly deciding to cut the cord. A bigger issue, however, is that they simply aren’t delivering a good enough product to maintain their domination in sports media.

The Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow model has steadily dropped from above 3% growth forecasted for Q1 2017 down to just barely positive as of today: 0.2%. Here is the reasoning from the Atlanta Fed:

April 27 marks the birthday of Herbert Spencer, which is worth noting in several respects. He was a polymath who made important contributions in many areas, including political theory and philosophy. He achieved greater widespread popularity than any other English philosopher, and is thought to be the only philosopher to sell over a million books in his lifetime. In the famous Supreme Court case of Lochner vs. New York, the majority opinion and Oliver Wendell Holmes’ dissenting opinion both related to him.

Many analysts are venturing to link the crisis that plagues the Venezuelan economy with the fall in the price of crude oil. With oil being one of the most important commodities in Venezuelan production and the country’s main export product, it seems that the fall in the price would bring any country with an economic structure similar to Venezuela’s into a crisis. Similarly, many assume that the problems in Ecuador have the same root as those in Venezuela, although less pronounced.

Many left libertarians demand open borders. Nations have no significance, they tell us. To think otherwise, to recognize any limits to immigration, arbitrarily restricts people’s liberty. Those of us who think otherwise, they say, are no better than fascists.

Joe Salerno’s brilliant and comprehensive article, “Mises on Nationalism, the Right to Self-Determination, and the Problem of Immigration” shows that Mises rejected the extreme anti-nationalist, open borders position.

“Science,” the method by which we understand the world and apply knowledge to improve human existence, is the latest casualty of the Progressive agenda. On April 22, 2017, several million people gathered at March for Science rallies across the United States to “stand up for science.” But surely science needs no publicity stunt in the industrialized world, where the benefits of scientific advancements — cars, electricity, cell phones, and the internet — are widely accepted. So what exactly are these demonstrators promoting?