Mises Wire
Guns, Drugs, and Booze: The Bipartisan Support for Prohibition
In the United States, both major parties are very fond of using the power of government to prohibit voluntary transactions among consenting adults. They merely disagree on which things to ban under pain of arrest and imprisonment.
There Is No Such Thing as “Settled Public Policy”
Following Supreme Court decisions, commentators often claim that a law is now "settled public policy." This is a tactic to silence dissent, and draws on fanciful ideas about the permanence of federal law. In real life, no political question is ever settled.
Stock Market Corrections are Deflationary, but There is No Inflation?
Stock market corrections are by definition deflationary events. The financial press seem to understand this. They’ve even started referring to “bubbles” once again with regard to recent shocks in US and Chinese stock markets. But they never explain what caused the rapid inflationary rise in equity prices to begin with. Somehow this is a mystery, since many economists insist that QE doesn't cause inflation.
Why Devaluing the Yuan Won’t Help China’s Economy
China has recently devalued its currency. Like many governments, the Chinese government thinks this will help the economy by increasing exports. But it will really just destroy real wealth in the process.
Why the Recurring Economic Crises?
A selection from Chapter 42 of Economic Controversies.
Electronic Music and the Market Test
An interesting theme in a 2014 documentary on electronic music (recently added to Netflix instant place), I Dream of Wires, is the tension between two different philosophies of developing electronic music technology. At the one end of the spectrum were the purist avant-garde musicians who worked primarily with very expensive and hard-to-use equipment that was a large departure from already established types of music-making. At the other end of the spectrum were the "commercial musicians" who wanted to make electronic music, but also wanted an interface that was easy to use.
Hostages and the Right to Pay Ransom
Many governments — including the US — have often inhumanely forbidden families from supplying ransoms to kidnappers to save loved ones. The Obama administration recently, and correctly, suspended the practice of prosecuting families in these cases.
