Economics

Archive for Economics

Life Insurance, the Forgotten Savings Vehicle

Most Americans today know precious little of their country’s history, besides things like certain U.S. presidents and big wars. For example, most Americans don’t know that because of Constitutional concerns, the Eisenhower Administration had to cite the need to quickly move tanks and troops around to fend off an invasion, as a national security justification […]

My Two Cents on Caplan’s “Proof”

[UPDATE below.] I saw this post from Bryan Caplan when I was jet-setting to Vegas, and thought something was really wrong with it. But I haven’t had time until now to write it up. Here’s Bryan: When economists explain marginalism, students often object, “But surely no one ever changes his behavior over a single penny.” […]

Yet More on Rules vs. Discretion in Monetary Policy

==> Steve Horwitz weighs in. ==> This was actually one of the few things I thought was cool in macro class in grad school. So let me reproduce the patronizing comment I left at Daniel Kuehn’s blog where he and I have taken the battle: DK [Daniel Kuehn] wrote: I suppose I was reading “do […]

Potpourri

==> Rob Bradley has some neat quotes from Milton Friedman, some of which I’ve never seen before. ==> Arthur Laffer and Ford Scudder lay out the looming “fiscal cliff.” Some big numbers for tax-rate increases that are currently in the cards. ==> The grand shi strategy of Ron Paul. ==> The mischievous von Pepe sends […]

Austerity Bask

OK kids, put your thinking caps on. I just spent an hour on the phone with a journalist for a household outlet, who is trying to give the “rest of the story” regarding the so-called fiscal cliff. He is saying that the conventional treatment of this story is, “Oh my gosh, if the government cuts […]

Two Views of Krugman

[UPDATE at end.] Daniel Kuehn is upset that Don Boudreaux leads his readers to believe that Milton Friedman and people like him have a monopoly on rule-based monetary policy. Daniel writes: Don, I think, is trying to pull the wool over his readers eyes here. The consensus for a long time now has been that […]

How Would a Free-Market Society Provide Law and Military Defense?

We answer these central questions in my new online Mises Academy class, which starts August 1. Summer pricing: the 6-week class is only $59! Full infomercial here.

More on Krugman and Marginal Product, Sans Calculus

By popular request, my new article at The American Conservative makes the same basic point that Karl Smith made back in November, but I think I spelled it out here very clearly to isolate Krugman’s mistake. Contrary to some of you guys in the comments, I don’t think the issue on this one was nominal […]