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Economics of Health Care

Why Can’t Food Stamps be Used for a Rotisserie Chicken?

By Craig Richardson | Feb 13, 2025

A few months ago, I was in a convenience store and was struck by a customer’s conversation.  Surveying the rows of chips, candy bars, ice cream, and soft drinks, she said to her friend, “I can literally buy anything I want in here with my EBT card, except for hot things, like the coffee or .. MORE

Economics of Crime

Should we allow bribery?

By Scott Sumner | Feb 13, 2025

Here’s the Financial Times: Donald Trump has ordered the Department of Justice to halt the enforcement of a US anti-corruption law that bars Americans from bribing foreign government officials to win business. In the past, I did several posts arguing that the US should ban corporations from paying money to those who engage in “ransomware”, .. MORE

Economic Education

EconLog Price Theory: The Membership Difference?

By Bryan Cutsinger | Feb 12, 2025

We’re bringing back price theory with our series on Price Theory problems with Professor Bryan Cutsinger. You can view the previous problem and Cutsinger’s solution here and here. Share your proposed solutions in the Comments. Professor Cutsinger will be present in the comments for the next couple of weeks, and we’ll post his proposed solution shortly thereafter. May the .. MORE

Energy, Environment, Resources

California’s New Fuel Standards Hurt the Poor, with Little Environment Benefit

By David Henderson | Feb 12, 2025

  California faces a firestorm, not just on fires, but also on energy. The state government continues to push households to electrify while, at the same time, electricity prices skyrocket. The dual impact of increasing dependence on electricity and a 35 to 45% boost in electric bills since 2020 is particularly hard on poor families. .. MORE

Books: Reviews and Suggested Readings

Reno On the Social Effects of Banishing The Strong Gods

By Kevin Corcoran | Feb 12, 2025

In my last post, I described what R. R. Reno believes motivated the banishing of the strong gods, as well as the ideas that made that process happen. In this post, I’ll be reviewing what he sees as the consequences. One of the strong gods to be banished was the idea that communities are a .. MORE

Cost-benefit Analysis

The Limits of Deep Research

By David Henderson | Feb 11, 2025

Those who read Tyler Cowen’s and Alex Tabarrok’s Marginal Revolution blog regularly, as I do, know that Tyler is a big fan of artificial intelligence (AI). Partly due to his posts and partly due to rave reviews by friends on Facebook, I’m realizing that I need to use it more. Having said that, I want .. MORE

Cross-country Comparisons

Jason Furman on Bidenomics

By Scott Sumner | Feb 11, 2025

Among economists on the other side of the political spectrum, Jason Furman has always been one of my favorites. He has a new article in Foreign Affairs entitled The Post-Neoliberal Delusion, which evaluates the economic policies of the Biden administration. In a number of specific cases, he supports Biden administration policies.  But Furman also raises .. MORE

Energy, Environment, Resources

Low Water Prices Mean More Damage from LA Fires

By Richard McKenzie | Feb 11, 2025

The historic—and horrific—fires that have decimated Los Angeles-area neighborhoods have been attributed to obvious causes, not the least of which include the two recent “wet years” that increased vegetation growth on hillsides and in backyards, followed by the last twelve months of drought that turned the added foliage into highly combustible fire fuel. Many experts .. MORE

Economic and Political Philosophy

Environmental Justice and Some Other Funny Stuff

By Pierre Lemieux | Feb 10, 2025

Once in a blue moon, President Donald Trump has a fleetingly good intuition or does something seemingly good (“good” from the point of view of preserving the hope of a free society). This is part of the problem. Consider the announced closing of the “Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights Office” in the Environmental Protection .. MORE

Moral Reasoning

Global nationalism?

By Scott Sumner | Feb 10, 2025

I’ve been very discouraged by the global rise in nationalism. But there is one glimmer of hope. Nationalism is often its own worst enemy. Consider the current situation in North America. President Trump clearly dislikes Canada’s Liberal party (especially Justin Trudeau), and would vastly prefer a Conservative government take power north of the border. But .. MORE

Economics of Education

My Weekly Reading for February 9, 2025

By David Henderson | Feb 9, 2025

Macro myths by Scott Sumner, The Pursuit of Happiness, February 5, 2025. Excerpt: I recently spoke to some Bentley University students (via zoom) about my views on the Great Recession. In this post, I summarize the substance of my talk. Long-time readers will have seen these arguments, but this blog has attracted some new readers .. MORE

Politics and Economics

Jimmy Carter: The First Reaganite

By John Phelan | Feb 8, 2025

In 1976, American voters registered their anger at Watergate, Richard Nixon, the Republican Party, and the Federal government generally by electing as President Jimmy Carter – with a term each in Georgia’s State Senate and Governor’s mansion and no experience of Washington D.C. whatsoever.  Carter frequently denounced “Washington” on the campaign trail and did little .. MORE

Economic and Political Philosophy

Where We Want to Go As A Society

By Pierre Lemieux | Feb 8, 2025

Commonly accepted ideas are often encapsulated in analogical or metaphorical expressions that people use unthinkingly. What they suggest may be true, false, uncertain, misleading, or meaningless. The most dangerous ones look deep or scientific even if they are meaningless. Experts in the exact sciences are often fond of them when speaking about social, political, or .. MORE

Labor Market

Bad News on Inflation

By Scott Sumner | Feb 7, 2025

Today’s jobs report provides more evidence for the view that inflation remains a very significant problem. Average hourly earnings rose by 0.5%, well above the 0.3% rate consistent with the Fed’s inflation target. Over the past 12 months, wage inflation has averaged 4.1%, which is only modestly above the roughly 3.0% to 3.5% figure consistent .. MORE

Economics of Health Care

The 1989 Repeal of an Entitlement

By David Henderson | Feb 7, 2025

In “Undoing Past Policies: How Likely Are Repeals in the 119th Congress?” political scientist Jordan Ragusa lays out a number of conditions that must obtain if repeal of past policies is to succeed. He makes very good points. The main example of a successful repeal that I know of is one that does not fit .. MORE

International Trade

Should Canada Become the 51st State?

By Walter Block | Feb 7, 2025

Before we explore both sides of this intriguing suggestion, let it be said that it deserves serious consideration, and not just because the president-elect of the United States suggested it. It also deserves our perusal on its own grounds. After all, that more than 3000-mile border between the two countries is not ordained by the .. MORE

Books: Reviews and Suggested Readings

Reno on the Banishing of the Strong Gods

By Kevin Corcoran | Feb 6, 2025

In my first post in this series, I outlined R. R. Reno’s idea of strong gods and weak gods as metaphors for the kinds of ideas that organize societies. Reno argues that the strong gods have been banished, or at least critically diminished, in favor of weak gods. What led to the banishment of the .. MORE

Liberty

Freedom and Responsibility

By Scott Sumner | Feb 5, 2025

In recent decades, the Federal government has steadily expanding the reach of regulation.  A very good Jacob Sullum piece in Reason magazine points out that this power allows the government to put informal pressure on companies in a way that restricts the freedom of speech: Why is Paramount so eager to settle this comical excuse .. MORE

Liberty

Liberalism, Not Only Freedom, as Vaccine

By Janet Bufton | Feb 5, 2025

Scott Sumner offers an argument that liberalism can be a vaccine against authoritarianism. I’m inclined to believe that committed liberals can’t be authoritarian because authoritarianism is illiberal. It’s not so much that liberalism is a vaccine as it is definitionally true that someone who endorses wholesale illiberalism forfeits the liberal label in the process.  That’s .. MORE

International Trade

Will Tariffs Lower Prices?

By Jon Murphy | Feb 4, 2025

Every once in a while, one will hear an argument for protectionism that protectionist tariffs will ultimately lead to lower prices.  The argument they make is an adjusted form of the infant industry argument:  domestic firms do not expand because of the presence of foreign competition.  Tariffs will force foreign competition out of the market.  .. MORE

Taxation

Deadweight Loss From Taxes is Proportional to the Square of the Tax Rate

By David Henderson | Feb 4, 2025

In a post last week, I stated that the deadweight loss from a tax is proportional to the square of the tax rate. So doubling the tax rate, for example, quadruples the deadweight loss. I stated on Facebook that I used basic algebra to prove this to my students. An economist friend asked me to .. MORE

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