I frequently receive comments about the strength of the United States economy and the unfairness of perceiving things as less than stellar. Is it really the “strongest economy ever”? It’s evident that it’s far from being the “strongest economy ever.”The United States unemployment rate has risen to 4.1%, the highest in three years, which is also significantly higher than the level seen in 2019. In June, a 70,000 increase in government jobs boosted payroll employment...
Read More »Why libertarians loathe tariffs
Former president and current Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump loves tariffs. In his 2011 book Time to Get Tough: Making America #1 Again, Trump included as part of his five-part tax policy “a 20 percent tax for importing goods.” During his first campaign for president, he called for a 35 percent tariff on cars and trucks imported from a proposed new Ford plant in Mexico and a 45 percent tariff on all imported goods from China “if they don’t behave.”...
Read More »Princeton historian: Just get over Watergate already!
Historian Julian Zelizer writes that Watergate-style investigations are OK sometimes, but we shouldn’t go overboard in being mistrustful of the government. After all, “faith in government,” Zelizer writes, “is necessary for a healthy society.” As Rothbard notes below, the watergate scandal was an excellent event precisely because it undermined faith in government. Zelizer, however, tells us to “banish the memories of Watergate” so we can get over all this unhealthy...
Read More »What’s the Real Story Behind the Market’s Crazy Week
What is the Mises Institute? The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard. Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order....
Read More »Watergate-era “reforms” made the federal government even stronger
Today is the fiftieth anniversary of the resignation of President Richard Nixon, who later was pardoned of all Watergate crimes by President Gerald Ford. The Watergate break-in occurred at the Democratic National Committee headquarters office in June 1972 at the Watergate building in Washington, DC, during a presidential election year. The Nixon Administration exerted great effort to conceal its involvement in the break-in. The United States Department of Justice and...
Read More »America reaches a sad milestone
Last week the national debt reached 35 trillion dollars, a mere seven months after the debt reached 34 trillion dollars. To put this in perspective, the national debt first reached one trillion dollars in October of 1981, almost 200 years after the Constitution’s ratification!The fact that the government was adding one trillion dollars in debt in little over half a year was not deemed worthy of comment by President Biden, Vice President Harris, and most other US...
Read More »China’s competitiveness is driven by low taxation, not by industrial policy
The West is getting increasingly worried about China’s export prowess as its companies are rapidly gaining market shares in green and high-tech industries. Recently, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen accused China of industrial overcapacity and urged Europeans to respond jointly to the latter’s nonmarket practices. Allegedly, China is flooding international markets with cheap products of good quality primarily due to industrial subsidies. The U.S. and its allies...
Read More »Why not eliminate taxes on all income?
During a campaign stop in Nevada early last month, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump promised that if elected, there would be no more federal tax on tips.Said Trump: “For those hotel workers and people that get tips, you’re going to be very happy, because when I get to office, we are going to not charge taxes on tips. You do a great job of service. You take care of people, and I think it’s going to be something that really is deserved.”According to the...
Read More »Biden’s parting deluge of deceit deserves damning
What is the Mises Institute? The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard. Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order....
Read More »Kamala Harris is awful
What is the Mises Institute? The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard. Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order....
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