The Free Market 21, no.4 (April 2003)

The Free Market 21, no. 4 (April 2003)

The Free Market 21, no. ( 2003)

Three years into one of the most severe bear markets in history, the most striking feature of the typical economic discussion is the persistent state of denial about how perilous our situation truly is. Also notable is the unthinking promulgation of a species of economic fallacies which, though long since discredited, keep springing up like weeds to choke our reasoning about where we might go from here and, therefore, of how we should be preparing to act. Let us take a look at a few of the more important reasons.

The Free Market 21, no. 6 (June 2003)

In recent newspaper columns, Paul Krugman of Princeton University and Lawrence Kudlow have sounded deflation alarms. The solution to combat falling prices, they argue, is for the Federal Reserve System to increase the money supply.

The Free Market 21, no. 6 (June 2003)

The Free Market 21, no. 6 (June 2003)

When it comes to national trends, Georgia tends to be not a leader but a laggard—which is a fine quality if the country is marching toward Leviathan.

An example of a national trend in which Georgia has been a laggard is the trend in cigarette taxes. Over the past decade, states have been all but chain-raising their cigarette taxes. Nineteen states raised their cigarette taxes in 2002 alone.

All the while, Georgia maintained its cigarette tax at 12¢ per pack.

The Free Market 23, no. 7 (July 2003)

How powerful is economic law, that mysterious aspect of the structure of reality that causes prices to rise and fall and thereby give direction concerning the use of resources? More powerful than the US government, even more powerful than all the governments in the world combined. In Iraq, the US demonstrated that it can overthrow a despotic government but it can’t finally control economic forces, particularly as they affect money.

The Free Market 23, no. 7 (July 2003)

Few countries around the world wanted to be entangled in the war on Iraq, but everyone seems eager to participate in reconstruction. The United States, as primary military aggressor, has estimated the cost of this effort as totaling $100 billion over the next several years.

The Free Market 23, no. 7 (July 2003)

No one can argue about the current moribund economy, complete with falling stock prices, nonexistent profits, layoffs, airline bankruptcies, and exploding federal and state budget deficits. People certainly have argued about the cause of this downturn, but few people have accurately pointed out why there is no recovery from the original recession.