Jul 08
The great Enlightenment writer and thinker Rousseau once wrote in his DISCOURSE ON THE ORIGIN AND FOUNDATION OF INEQUALITY that “[I]t is very difficult to reduce to obedience one who does not seek command.” In order to be free, in order not to be a slave, one must first renounce the desire to be a …
Jul 05
If Americans only had the courage to do nothing, and unleash the power of capitalism on health care, prices would come quickly down so that the poorest consumers could afford quality health care. Hobos, bums and vagabonds could afford quality health care if the government got out of it. Just look at the telecommunications industry …
Jun 22
The Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) was passed in the early 1990s and signed into law by President George H.W. Bush. The law was passed with claims that it would help get people with disabilities gainfully employed. But years later, we learn that the Act had the opposite effect. Employment of men with disabilities fell …
Jun 22
On June 10, 2015, the USA Today printed a front-page feature article about the health of America’s seniors. The story reported that “15 % of seniors account for nearly half of Medicare spending.” And one amazing fact stood out: The seniors of today are generally sicker than predecessors, measured by numbers of illness diagnoses. Fully …
Apr 01
When politicians vote to impose or raise minimum wages, they put poor people out of work and INCREASE poverty. No one has ever calculated how many economic studies establish the correlation between minimum-wage laws and unemployment rates. But the number is in the many dozens and probably in the hundreds. Minimum wage laws have done …
Mar 27
The best solution to social problems is almost always for politicians to do nothing. As the great economic thinker Julian Simon demonstrated in his books, humans will solve all their problems if they are left free. But policymakers and government trusters tend to insist on political “solutions.” Now we learn that the deaths of 150 …
Mar 25
We previously reported that the “Affordable Care Act” (“Obamacare”) was expected by the Congressional Budget Office to result in 1.5 to 2 percent fewer total hours worked by Americans. Now a survey shows the damage to American productivity is even worse. A survey by the Society for Human Resource Management of 743 human resources professionals …
Mar 24
A 2004 study by C. Eugene Steuerle, Adam Carasso and Lee Cohen of the Urban Institute, entitled “How Progressive is Social Security and Why?,” found that Social Security is a massive transfer from poor groups to rich Americans. Although “Social Security was designed to redistribute income from those with higher lifetime earning to thos with …
Mar 18
In the words of the immortal Harry Browne, “Each government program carries within it the seeds of future programs that will be ‘needed’ to clean up the mess the first program creates.” (Why Government Doesn’t Work, 1995, p 17). Herbert Spencer remarked in 1850 that there was scarcely a bill introduced in the British Parliament …
