A Foreign Aid Disaster in the Making
In the wake of the tsunami disaster in Indonesia, governments throughout the world are doing what governments always do: throwing money at the problem, writes Thomas DiLorenzo.
The Privatization of Foreign Aid
There was a very good article in the NY Times today that serves as a kind of postscript to David J. Heinrich’s essay WSJ’s Taranto Slanders Ayn Rand Institute.
Cicero on Justice, Law and Liberty
Marcus Tullius Cicero was born 2,111 years ago yesterday.
According to Anthony Everitt, he was “an unknowing architect of constitutions that still govern our lives.” John Adams said of him, “All ages of the world have not produced a greater statesman and philosopher combined.” Thomas Jefferson said the Declaration of Independence was based on “the elementary books of public right, as Aristotle, Cicero, Locke, Sidney, etc.”
WSJ’s Taranto Slanders Ayn Rand Institute
David Holcberg, of the Ayn Rand Institute, published U.S. Should Not Help Tsunami Victims [Our money is not the government’s to give]. In response, James Taranto, of the Wall Street Journal‘s slandered the ARI. The Ayn Rand Institute’s Holcberg argued that:
Paid Enough to Buy the Product
The newest argument against Wal-Mart is that it is failing to follow the Ford Motor Co. example of increasing wages so that employees can afford the products they are producing. But William Anderson shows that Ford’s wage increases were not charity.
Broken window fallacy defended
Bloomberg finds economists to refute Christopher Westley on Mises.org. Yes, they argue that disasters can generate economic growth so long as they are predictable and frequent. Broken and destroyed property is usually replaced using better technology, they say. Using this logic, the federal government should spur greater growth and technological development by regularly and frequently bulldozing random homes and businesses across the country.
Entrepreneurship and Self-Finance
The Infant Industry Argument
I’ve been corresponding with a reader (R. Nelson) who says he once was a fervent free trader but has now lost the faith. Specifically, he claims that the US, Japan, Germany, and (if memory serves) other countries all grew rich behind protectionist walls, while Great Britain (he claims) lost its preeminence due to free trade.
Minimum Wage, Maximum Intervention
Thousands of workers in five states and the District of Columbia are getting a raise today, but not because of the generosity of their employers or because they have suddenly become more productive. That relic from FDR’s New Deal, the minimum wage, increases today in the District of Columbia and the states of Illinois, New York, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington.
