‘Interest rate spike endangers economy’
“Those days when neighbors could lean across the hedge and brag about their new ultra-low mortgage rates are just about over,” says the Christian Science Monitor. (Courtesy John Gisclon.)
Pensions for the Parasites
State pension plans, designed to make sure that the tax eaters never go hungry, are in trouble. But not to worry. “State courts consistently have ruled that taxpayers must pay all promised benefits, regardless of the financial health of a state or its retirement system. Some experts say that...huge tax increases might be required to pay benefits as baby boomers begin to retire..., so substantial in some states that they would depress the local economy for a generation.”
Protecting us from the three tenors
- FTC Finds Conspiracy in Three Tenors Case (Reuters): “The U.S. Federal Trade Commission on Monday upheld charges that three subsidiaries of France’s Vivendi Universal conspired to fix the price of a 1998 recording by The Three Tenors, the agency said. The FTC’s five commissioners voted unanimously to back an earlier ruling that Vivendi’s PolyGram unit had improperly agreed with an AOL Time Warner Inc.
Where Does Tyler Cowen Draw the Line?
George Mason University economist Tyler Cowen, in a critique of the gold standard and free banking on another economics blog, clarifies where he draws the line at free market solutions and thinks statism is to be preferred. The economic performance resulting form a gold standard, he says, would have improved the economy in the 1970s (if it were in place) but would have hindered the economy in the 1990s (again, if it were in place). Nonetheless, we should not have a gold standard, a
Rothbard Reviewed
Rothbard’s Man, Economy, and State, and Ethics of Liberty, reviewed at Samizdata.net: “But what a joy of leisured utility! Although Rothbard promises you he’s about to cover the whole of economics in one mighty swoop, it’s a breeze.
Not All Unemployment is Bad News
Sluggish Economy Takes Toll on Government Jobs (USAToday): “Government employment at all levels fell by 10,000 in July — the fifth-straight monthly decline, the Labor Department said Friday. The number of government jobs has fallen by 115,000 since February.”
Hoppe in Baghdad
“With the destruction of the socialist central state, a natural aristocracy has risen to adjudicate disputes in Iraq,” writes Thomas Schmidt.
Innovation in Surgery
Brainstorm to Breakthrough: A Surgical Procedure is Born (NYT): “Surgeons who want to try something new have a great deal of leeway, because new operations, unlike new drugs, are not regulated by the government. As a result, many surgical techniques have simply been brought into practice by doctors who invented them, started using them and then taught them to colleagues.”
Pro-Entrepreneur Movie
Gary North on the movie Seabiscuit: “His owner, Charles Howard, started out as a bicycle repairman-turned salesman whose product was outmoded. A series of half a dozen scenes, spanning at most two days, are brilliantly crafted to tell the story of his transition from a failed bicycle salesman to a rich car dealer. This really is the story of the great age of entrepreneurship: a man with an untried technical skill who sees a better way to do the job, and who gets rich as a result.
de Jasay on Property Rights
Today, the Library of Economics and Liberty is running the first part of a three-part series on the nature of property rights. ”He begins with an analysis of the 17th century English political philosopher, John Locke, and continues by taking on a number of philosophers who belong to what he calls the “ownership is a myth” school: J. Christman, L. Murphy and T.
