Bob Murphy

Author Archive

“Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s, and to God What Is God’s”

Someone emailed and asked me to discuss the famous “render unto Caesar” story. So I’ll quote it in full (from Matthew 22), but I’m going to follow with what comes after, to put it in context: Paying Taxes to Caesar 15 Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words. 16 And they sent their disciples […]

The Primary Determinants of Your Child’s Weight

“They just grow up so fast…” said one of the parents as we watched the graduation ceremony. People talk like this a lot, but there’s really no mystery about the size of your child, once we specify the units (such as pounds). School lunch policy drives the growth in class calorie consumption, and the growth […]

Potpourri

==> In the latest Contra Krugman, Tom and I tackle the eternal question: Is taxation theft? ==> Speaking of Krugman, Rob Bradley discusses a Resources for the Future (RFF) post that says Krugman is full of it when he breezily claims that wind and solar will produce all of our energy. ==> Although he’s inexplicably […]

Free Traders Should Be More Careful When Defending Trade Deficits

In a recent WSJ piece, Robert Barro pushed back against Trump’s mercantilism by arguing: “Imports are things we want, whether consumer goods, raw materials or intermediate goods. Exports are the price we have to pay to get the imports. It would be great, in fact, if we could get more imports without having to pay […]

“That’s My King!” Full Sermon

Ryan Griggs tipped me off to this full sermon that contained the awesome “That’s My King!” portion (which I’ve posted here on the blog several times). I haven’t been able to listen to this yet but here ya go:

Another Arrow in Your Quiver

Here are my class notes on Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem (thanks to Transformer for hosting the PDF). You have to be able to read formal set theory notation, but other than that there’s no prior knowledge required.

The Slugfest Continues: My Article on the FRB Debate With Selgin

My one regret in the Soho Forum debate with George Selgin–besides the fact that he won according to Oxford rules–is that we didn’t have time to spell out our respective positions a bit more clearly. For example, a lot of people on social media assumed I thought (a) fractional reserve banking was fraudulent and (b) […]

Potpourri

==> I just became aware of this being available–it’s my QJAE article saying that Roger Garrison’s framework is compatible with neoclassical growth theory. ==> The latest Lara-Murphy Show tackles some tough objections, like, “If I expect a dollar crash, why do I want life insurance?” ==> Other people critique Krugman too, from National Review and […]