Bryan Caplan

Archive for Bryan Caplan

Bryan Caplan vs. Peter Thiel

Peter Thiel recently gave a qualified endorsement to raising the minimum wage, arguing that in the presence of generous welfare benefits it was a second-best solution (not his terminology). The argument made no sense to me, and I was going to write it up but Bryan Caplan beat me to the punch. My question: Is […]

Don’t Ask George Selgin to Dance

In a post full of his trademark pugnacity, George Selgin explains why he doesn’t consider himself an Austrian economist: I don’t want to belong to any economic school of thought, or to “do” any sort of economics. I just want to “do” my own sort of economics. And what sort of economics is that? I […]

Someone Has to Remind Bryan Caplan That No Such Thing as Utils

One of the issues in Bryan Caplan’s famous “Why I’m Not An Austrian Economist” essay (even though he had been one when he was younger) is the issue of cardinal utility functions. A lot of Rothbardians like to roll their eyes at the mainstream for thinking utility is a cardinal entity that can be measured […]

Truth Is Stranger Than Bryan Caplan’s Fiction

From my new post at Mises Canada: Caplan then goes on in his post to lament the odd fact that people do not respond to this potential of trillions of dollars in global wealth (via labor mobility) the way Caplan claims they would respond to the discovery of trillions of dollars of Leonium buried under […]

Potpourri

==> Mario Rizzo stands up for economic freedom and tolerance. ==> A few people have told me to highlight this apparent Krugman Kontradiction on unemployment benefits and job search (scroll down a bit). I actually highlighted this when it initially occurred (perhaps because somebody brought it to my attention, I can’t remember). However, Krugman on […]

Two Kitten Torturing Models of Wage Differentials

Suppose you read a blog post that started like this: It is well known that if you run a regression analysis of wages, you will find that if a person tortured kittens as a teenager, then he or she will have significantly lower earnings in the marketplace. Now there are two schools of thought when […]

Potpourri

==> David R. Henderson on the Nobel. ==> When reading posts like this from Bryan, I wonder if he hands out the syllabus on the first day of class that just says “YOU WILL GET NOTHING FROM THIS CLASS” at the top. ==> MoveOn.org starts a petition to arrest Republicans in Congress for sedition. I’m […]

Bryan Caplan Values His Body Far Too Cheaply

I was very much enjoying the latest skirmish between Tyler Cowen and Bryan Caplan–no matter who loses, I win–when I was astounded by this argument from Bryan, to drive home his point about how awful immigration restrictions are: The obvious moral objection is that comparing slavery and immigration restrictions is absurd hyperbole. But it’s absurd […]