By Mack Ott

International capital flows are the financial side of international trade.1 When someone imports a good or service, the buyer (the importer) gives the seller (the exporter) a monetary payment, just as in domestic transactions. If total exports were equal to total imports, these monetary transactions would balance at ne...

By Arnold Kling

Much of the time, it is in the interest of the individual to follow the crowd but in the social interest for individuals to say and do what they think best. Well-functioning institutions take steps to discourage conformity and to promote dissent, partly to protect the rights of dissenters but mostly to protect interest...

Economist and author Daron Acemoglu of MIT discusses with EconTalk host Russ Roberts the challenge of shared prosperity and the policies that could bring about a more inclusive economy. Acemoglu argues for the importance of good jobs over redistribution and makes the case for the policies that could lead to jobs and op...

By Alberto Mingardi

I sent the following letter on the Financial Times (which ran it last week): Sir - All that glitters is not gold. Ursula von der Leyen's vision of EU as regulatory superpower (Brussels' new-look team raises stakes with Trump, September 11) may look superficially attractive - but it does not necessarily swithtand a clo...

By Amy Willis

  Have you been enjoying your red wine and dark chocolate every evening, amassing their health benefits along the way? Or have you been slowly subtracting days from your life via the same practice? It's hard to know what to make of the torrent of health and nutrition advice that comes our way, and that's the su...

Can a great leader or manager be humble in public? Or is exuding confidence, even when it may not be merited, a key part of leadership? In this episode of EconTalk, host Russ Roberts talks with David Deppner, CEO of Psyberware, about an email David sent Russ wondering how Russ might reconcile his passion for humility a...

By Lester C. Thurow

In a capitalistic society, profits—and losses—hold center stage. Those who own firms (the capitalists) choose managers who organize production efforts so as to maximize their income (profits). Their search for profits is guided by the famous “invisible hand” of capitalism. When profits are above the normal leve...

By David Henderson

A number of people in the United States argue for increasing the number of electric vehicles as a percent of the automobile stock. Their argument is that in the United States, transportation contributes 29% of the total carbon dioxide emissions. (Everything that follows is 2017 data.) Industry contributes 22%, elect...

By Roger Donway

In 1976, Friedrich Hayek effectively read Samuel Smiles out of the classical-liberal movement. In The Mirage of Social Justice, Hayek said that the work of Samuel Smiles (1812-1904) constitutes a snare and a delusion for pro-capitalists. Smiles's defense of free enterprise, Hayek lamented, seemed to be "the only defenc...

By David Henderson

  We need to restore a constituency and a faith that we can have a productive foreign policy, and I think that part of what that will entail is putting diplomacy and burden sharing at the front of our messaging and of our packaging and of our actions. Right now, humanitarian intervention, if it happens — and ...