After very quickly becoming an advanced economy, South Korea is experiencing declining growth and labor productivity. The culprit, as usual, is government intervention in the market to favor certain interests.
There's a new kind of capitalism on the scene: "surveillance capitalism." It's drawn attention from across the political spectrum, but Left, Right, and center offer very different solutions to similar concerns.
How much licensing requirements are designed to “protect” the health of the public, and how much to restrict competition, may be gauged from the fact that giving medical advice free without a license is rarely a legal offense. Only the sale of medical advice requires a license.
The conservative case against market freedom is based on the belief that if change disrupts the status quo in any way, or if companies impose cost reductions that result in a shifting of employment — or even some layoffs — then government should step in and take control.
Nothing short of an economic exorcism is needed in Zimbabwe. Looking at what President Mnangagwa has done so far, it doesn’t seem that Zimbabwe is actually serious about making tough reforms.
So long as governments exist, it is essential that we minimize the ability of groups and individuals to use the power of the state to enrich themselves.
Clearly marked prices on private-sector cash-payment surgeries are a great thing. In fact, the competition of for-profit surgery centers drives down prices at more "traditional" (i.e., highly bureaucratized) hospitals.
The ECB, always happy to repeat the mistakes of Japan, is likely to start new programs of debt monetization for green projects and claim it is a different, radical and new measure.
If we stick to the data, regardless of which socioeconomic indicator we choose, it seems clear that the sharp economic downturn began long before 2017.
