Genetic Discrimination Saves Lives

Thanks to recent technological innovations, companies like 23andMe are now able to offer comprehensive genetic profiles that can reveal predispositions towards certain health problems, and allow patients to take proactive measures to prevent them. Unfortunately, this potentially lifesaving diagnosis will not be available to most individuals because of so-called “genetic privacy” laws, such as the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act, passed by the House last year.

Why Is Bernanke Trying to Fight the Bear?

Last Tuesday, January 22, 2008, the US central bank lowered its federal funds rate target by a hefty 0.75% to 3.5%. The panicky decision to lower the fed funds rate target was made ahead of the Fed’s meeting at the end of this month. Last Tuesday’s cut by the Fed was the largest nonscheduled interest-rate cut in more than 20 years. Let us say that the present aggressive interest rate stance by the Fed fails to prevent the economy from falling into a recession; what kind of action is Bernanke then going to undertake?

Last Knight Live Blog 25 - Kraus

Chapter 18, Émigré in New York, opens the fourth and last part of the book, Mises in America. The outbreak of WWII and the rapid advance of German troops throughout Western Europe created an imminent threat to Mises’s freedom and very life even in neutral and relatively safe Geneva. He had to leave Europe almost immediately, leaving behind everything he accomplished and cared about, starting a new life and facing an insecure future in the only country that could provide safe haven for him - United States of America.

Cheering NPR

I never thought I’d be cheering NPR, but Michelle Norris really makes Sen. Baucus squirm. Sure her economic theory is off, but some of her questions are spot on.
Norris: “Will this stimulus package in the end add to the nation’s deficit woes?” Baucus: “Well ... it’s ... um ... My thought is ... It probably will initially, but all economists say we should do this. All ... I’m not saying all, the vast majority of economists say we should do this.

A Creditors’ Protection Bill

The Fed and the rest of the government seem to think that their job is always to be sure that the stock market averages and the price of homes is never to be allowed to fall too far below their most recent peaks, and to flood the economy with as much new and additional money as may be required to accomplish this. Keeping up housing prices is an especially remarkable goal, inasmuch as only a year or two ago, all of the complaining was about how far housing prices had climbed relative to the ability of people to afford them.

Grant the Great

James Grant, Jeff Tucker’s favorite New York Timer, tries to understand “[h]ow...the supposedly “contained” subprime mortgage problem metastasize[d] into a global financial panic.” Given this article’s appearance on Mises.org, is it surprising that Grant places blame on the Federal Reserve? In a speech before he became Chairman of the Fed, Ben Bernanke talked about a “Great Moderation” that
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