Now that the Bush Administration has wrapped up its sixty-stop, sixty-day campaign to bolster support for its Social Security proposal, the machinery is cranking in that great deliberative body, the U.S. Congress. The latest development is Bush’s suggestion to index benefits for wealthy retirees to prices (rather than wages), which is effectively a cut in promised benefits.

I think the state of economics - never mind the economy - in Argentina may be parlous indeed. This description of a “Debt Museum” opened in the economics department of the University of Buenos Aires gives me the impression of simplification reduced to metaphor - and inapposite metaphor at that.

For an Austrian II class we read Kinsella’s famous “Against Intellectual Property.” I generally found it to be every bit worth the hype, but naturally I can’t help but offer a few criticisms. I do so here on this blog because I don’t know of a more appropriate forum:

In expressing concern about a bill sneaking through Congress that would make state issued driver’s licenses into national IDs, a New York Times Editorial is concerned that the gov’t will forget: “the real purpose of driver’s licenses: safe drivers.” There’s just one problem. Driver’s licenses were not introduced for that reason.

Russ Roberts dismantles recent anti-WM criticism here.

An idea, for anyone interested: critics accuse WM of paying sub-standard wages, but from what I understand, they also offer deep employee discounts. Has anyone calculated the value of Wal-Mart’s total compensation accounting for these discounts? Reducing one’s grocery bill by 25% could be a powerful incentive to Wal-Mart employment, and one that might not show up in the wage data.

It seems that the faculty of the University of Missouri isn’t too keen about the idea of being under the thumb of Raymond W. Alden, Hans Hoppe’s tormentor.

Says William McDonough, executive vice president of the United Food and Commercial Workers union, in today’s New York Times:

says the MSNBC “Answer Desk.” Well I’m relieved to find this out, and also to learn from the “Answer Desk” that the Fed is a valiant inflation fighter. I guess the bright side of all this is that now it may be easier to rid ourselves of the Fed...or maybe not.

...if only we really were just mouthpieces for wealthy patrons. Details here. (Thanks to Kyle Jackson for alerting me to this.)