About

About the Blog

The iron law of politics is that inertia always wins. Hence the name of this blog.

The main focus here is regulation. I also write about economics, politics (I’m an independent — sorry, partisans), history, literature, thinkers I admire, media, books, and other topics. And I like to sneak in the occasional post about sports.

The underlying philosophy at Inertia Wins is liberalism, in the word’s original sense. Fans of Locke, Hume, Voltaire, Adam Smith, Bastiat, and Hayek will find a lot to like here.

The indecipherable scribbling in the banner picture above is the Magna Carta. It represents the kind of inertia that I hope will prevail in the long run.

All opinions on this blog are mine, and not necessarily my employer’s.

About the Author

Ryan Young is the 2009-2010 Warren Brookes Journalism Fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. His writings communicate ideas from economics and classical liberal political theory in layman’s terms. His articles apply the economic way of thinking to issues from airplane baggage restrictions to fiscal stimulus to salary caps in baseball.

He has been published in Politico, Investor’s Business Daily, The Washington Examiner, The Detroit News, Real Clear Markets, and other outlets, and his work has been cited in Congressional testimony. Ryan has also been cited in Yahoo! Finance, Instapundit, eWeek, and Media Matters, among other venues. He also writes the popular “Regulation of the Day” feature for Open Market, CEI’s staff blog.

Ryan holds an M.A. in economics from George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, and a B.A. in history from Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin. He was previously Fellow in Regulatory Studies at CEI, and worked in the Cato Institute’s government affairs department.