Turns out there is a second minimum wage — a minimum wage for the disabled (currently, the minimum is effectively zero). And for supposedly moral reasons (reckoned in the absence of the morality of labor itself), some so-called advocates for the disabled are tirelessly working to price them out of the labor market. This interesting article (the
While on an evening bike ride with my oldest son, we reminisced about one of the first government meetings we attended together — an annexation hearing before our county commissioners. Looking back, we agreed that the meeting turned out to be an invaluable opportunity to witness government in action. At the hearing, the attorney for the petitioner
Whether the middle schoolers in your life are educated at home or elsewhere, the best way to introduce the economics of Liberty is Whatever Happened to Penny Candy? This is the book that introduced me – at age 38 – to Austrian Economics. I read the book after my homeschooling wife bought it as an economics text for my oldest son. Penny Candy shook
The nature of man being what it is, the desire for fun and leisure is limitless. After a hard week of working and saving, Friday night is enough reason to open the barn door for music and celebration. Farmer Bob woke Monday to face another week of reaping that which he had sown. He knows the routine: out to the fields in the morning for a long day
Does government function as a club or a prison? In particular, are local taxing districts — local governmental entities — simply clubs where residents voluntarily pay fees set by an elected board? Or, are these districts nothing more than prisons, so to speak, where the governing body extracts fines and penalties from land and labor? First, let us
Due to Obamacare, my health plan has become something other than insurance. It is now, for the most part, nothing other than a wealth transfer scheme to benefit the politically connected over others. In order to identify the difference between health insurance and government-mandated health care coverage , we can look to Human Action , in which
It’s that time of year here in Ohio: time to make a list and check it twice. Christmas gift list? Not in this instance. It’s time for county auditors throughout the state to cause the publication of their annual lists of delinquent real property taxes. Is the intent to shame the naughty into paying their fair share? To a point. However, I believe
I didn’t realize that Japan had enacted a law that will certainly improve it’s economic malaise: Under a national law that came into effect two months ago, companies and local governments must measure the waistlines of Japanese people ages 40 to 74 as part of their annual checkups. That represents more than 56 million waistlines, or about 44
A remorseful Dr. Frankenstein speaking to Captain Walton about the monster he (Frankenstein) created and unleashed, “You seek for unlimited power , as I once did; and I ardently hope that the gratification of your wishes may not be a serpent to sting you, as mine has been.” (quote from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein , paraphrased) It’s election eve
I say I’m nosy, my wife says I’m bitter. She’s probably right. Regardless, our township contracts out residential refuse and garbage removal. All residents are required to pay for the service, whether they use it or not. The current contract was about to end so the township sent it out for bid. Since I am nosy (my view), I wanted to see what
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.