Appleton, WI police taught some children a lesson about regulation’s true purpose by shutting down their lemonade and cookie stands. The children live about a block from an annual Old Car Show, and have been selling lemonade and cookies near the event for six years.
Vendors inside the car show didn’t appreciate the competition. So they talked the city government into passing a new ordinance that put the girls out of business.
After a round of bad publicity, city officials are thinking of re-writing the ordinance.
Posted onJuly 15, 2011|Comments Off on Fun Fact of the Day
A lot of people like to make fun of the French. I don’t. France’s intellectual heritage is among the world’s finest. Even though contemp0rary politics there are decidedly illiberal, France was home to many of liberalism’s brightest lights.
The French Enlightenment gave the world Diderot, the encyclopedist; Voltaire, the conscience of Europe; Montesquieu’s grand narratives of history; Helvetius’ pre-Bentham utilitarianism; and Condorcet’s infinitely perfectible man. And that’s just for starters.
Economists everywhere owe a huge debt to the Physiocrats, especially Turgot and Quesnay, for what they taught a young Adam Smith when he traveled to France. Many of their lessons found their way into the Wealth of Nations. Bastiat, 160 years after his death, remains one of the discipline’s sharpest wits and most effective popularizers.
Add to that the deliciousness of French food and the fact that Gojira, one of my favorite metal bands, hails from Bayonne (video below), and the dramatic achievements of Corneille and Racine, and one can see why I think the French don’t deserve to be the butt of so many jokes.
Which brings me to today’s fun fact: the world’s first academic journal exclusively devoted to economics was founded in France. The Journal Oeconomique was founded in 1751, a full quarter of a century before the Wealth of Nations was published in 1776. Other pre-Smithian economics journals included the Gazette du Commerce and the Journal de l’Agriculture, du Commerce et des Finances.
Something to keep in mind next time you crack a joke about France.
The highest-paid state employee in California last year, a prison surgeon who took home $777,423, has a history of mental illness, was fired once for alleged incompetence and has not been allowed to treat an inmate for six years because medical supervisors don’t trust his clinical skills.
Posted onJuly 8, 2011|Comments Off on Schumpeter on Why People Are Bad at Arguing
It’s because people rely on ad hominems and straw-man arguments. These leave the opponents’ actual arguments untouched, and resolve nothing.
So true is it that, in science as elsewhere, we fight for and against not men and things as they are, but for and against the caricatures we make of them.
Posted onJuly 7, 2011|Comments Off on Proposed DC Taxi Regulations Would Harm Drivers, Customers
One of the best arguments for free markets is that bad things happen when businesses and government get together. As with church and state, it’s better to keep them separate. DC residents are finding that out for themselves, as this video about proposed taxi regulations shows.
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Posted onJuly 6, 2011|Comments Off on The Spending Cut that Isn’t
Congress is debating a $2 trillion spending cut right now. Or at least that’s what they’re calling it. Ten years from now, even with the cut in place, spending is projected to be $1.8 trillion higher than it is today. This video explains why in one short minute:
Posted onJuly 4, 2011|Comments Off on Schumpeter on Ideology
Schumpeter believed that, because people are fallible creatures, even the scientific method isn’t entirely objective. Ideology is reflected in, say, a scientist’s (or an economist’s) choice to research one topic instead of another, or the patterns they find (or miss) while interpreting the data:
“It embodies the picture of things as we see them, and wherever there is any possible motive for wishing to see them in a given rather than another light, the way in which we see things can hardly be distinguished from the way we wish to see them.”
Posted onJuly 1, 2011|Comments Off on ATM: Wrong for America
Here is a hilarious short video accusing ATMs of killing jobs, loitering on street corners late at night, and even dispensing money to terrorists. It’s good. I couldn’t figure out how to embed it on this site, so you’ll have to click the link to watch it.
Inertia Wins! 