EconLog Archive
Fiscal Policy
On Greece and Weimar: Self-Serving Statements Can Still Be True
Bloomberg: Prime Minister Antonis Samaras compared Greeks’ struggle with economic hardship and political turmoil with the conditions that led to the collapse of the Weimar Republic in post-World War I Germany and ushered in the Nazi era. Remember what Keynes thought about the Economic Consequences of the Peace, and recall that the main alternative to .. MORE
Books: Reviews and Suggested Readings
Henderson on John Goodman’s Priceless
My review of health economist John Goodman’s book, Priceless, is now out. I’m generally positive about the book, but I do have some major criticisms. Some positive excerpts: A dominant theme in health care reform is what Goodman calls “the engineering approach.” This is the idea that all we need to do is figure out .. MORE
Fiscal Policy
Tiebout Progressivity: That Didn’t Take Long
From the FT: France’s Socialist government has been forced into retreat by an online revolt by entrepreneurs and investors against its plans to raise capital gains taxes. It said it would review the details of its budget proposal to bring taxes on income from capital in line with tax bands for earned income after a .. MORE
Monetary Policy
Supermajority Rule: Buchanan, Tullock, Bernanke
Most supporters of democracy embrace the ideal of majority rule. The great Swedish economist Knut Wicksell started from a different ideal: Unanimity. If your idea is so great, shouldn’t we all agree to it? And even if it’s only a great idea for 51% of the people, if it’s truly great then the 51% should .. MORE
Economics of Health Care
Last Night’s Debate on Health Care
I’m so glad that I don’t need to use quotation marks around the word “debate” in the title above. For the days leading up to it, every time I’ve mentioned it, I’ve used quotation marks because the typical format is Q&A where, if the candidates are good at evading or outright lying, they can often .. MORE
Fiscal Policy
Why the GOP is the Bigger Default Risk
Because Democrats really, really believe in death panels. Steve Rattner, a former Obama Administration official, used the term (presumably as a form of gallows humor) in the Times a few weeks ago. Rattner’s piece hits some of the same themes as the New England Journal of Medicine essay on “global spending targets” coauthored by .. MORE
Energy, Environment, Resources
Freakonomics on Shale Gas
Steve Sexton over at Freakonomics has an excellent piece on shale gas. It lays out some basic economics beautifully. Before I continue, a disclosure: I have invested in a fracking operation in Colorado. I wish I hadn’t, but that’s another story. Some key paragraphs: A suite of technologies has brought vast supplies of previously unrecoverable .. MORE
Uncategorized
Welcome to Luigi Zingales
I remember the first time I saw Luigi Zingales speak. It was early 2009, at what Arnold called an “Anti-Stimulus Conference.” Arnold himself gave an excellent talk, my colleague Don Boudreaux did as well. Time exceptionally well spent. But the big surprise of the day was Zingales–in the style of academics, it seems most .. MORE
Books: Reviews and Suggested Readings
Autobiography of Malcolm X Book Club Update
I’ll post on part 3 (chapters 11-15) on October 12.
Economic and Political Philosophy
Tough Luck: A Followup Conversation With Bill Dickens
My post on “Tough Luck” sparked a Facebook conversation with the great Bill Dickens. Reprinted with his permission: Bill: You’ve got to be kidding me. The problem with most of your examples is simple. While Libertarians have to say tough luck! The person defending government would say “Hmm… your right! Let’s change that!” At worst .. MORE
Fiscal Policy
Treasury Bondholders: Winning in the Senate?
Many are convinced that the U.S. government will likely either default or hyperinflate its way out of debt. I disagree: I think Treasury bondholders will win. As I wrote in Econ Journal Watch: A U.S. default is unlikely: As a demographically young nation, the United States will watch other nations face demographic crises years before .. MORE
Economic and Political Philosophy
Tough Luck
“What if a poor person gets sick, doesn’t have insurance, and can’t get friends, family, or charity to pay for treatment?” “What if an elderly person gets defrauded out of his entire retirement and the perpetrator vanishes into thin air?” “What if a child is starving on the street, and no one voluntarily feeds him?” .. MORE
Economic and Political Philosophy
Welcome, Luigi Zingales
Starting this week and for the next few months, Econlog will have a guest blogger, Luigi Zingales. Professor Zingales is the Robert C. McCormack Professor of Entrepreneurship and Finance and the David G. Booth Faculty Fellow. We have not met personally, but I’m a fan of his recent book, A Capitalism for the People. Here’s .. MORE
Energy, Environment, Resources
Robert Murphy: A New Result on Carbon Taxes
Just about every public discussion of carbon tax swaps implicitly assumes that the distortions emanating from the tax code must decrease if the government begins taxing a negative externality (carbon emissions) and uses the revenue to reduce tax rates on productive activity. However, the analysis of the tax interaction effect shows that this assumption may .. MORE
Behavioral Economics
Group IQ: One Source of Trustworthiness
In Arnold’s new essay entitled “Libertarians and Group Norms,” he writes: [W]e live in a world that demands enormous levels of trust among strangers…I doubt that anyone fully comprehends what holds this fabric of trust together. I agree. But we’re building comprehension, one journal article at a time. A new line of experimental research shows .. MORE
Growth: Consequences
How Stagnant Are We? A Time Diary Self-Experiment
An argument I’ve repeatedly had with Tyler Cowen: Tyler: We’re stagnating!Bryan: No we’re not. You’re ignoring massive CPI bias. We live in an age of consumption-biased technological change. Official numbers don’t adequately adjust for quality improvements, and utterly ignore the mountains of free stuff we keep receiving.Tyler: How massive?Bryan: Oh… Say 1 percentage-point per year.Tyler: .. MORE
Economics of Health Care
Welcome Back, McArdle
Megan McArdle is back blogging regularly. I happened to come across this one: “America Really is Exceptional.” It’s very good. Some highlights: I actually don’t think that the latter point is true; if you plucked an average American (mean, median, or modal) out of Kansas City or Aurora, and plopped them down in the middle .. MORE
Finance
The Wisdom of Commenter Greg G
On Speed Bankruptcy: Of course this would raise capital costs. That is a feature, not a bug. We have seen the results of underpricing credit risk.
Public Goods
Is the Georgist Single Tax Pigovian?
On Facebook, John Strong asks me: Bryan, earlier this year you offered some arguments against a Georgist land tax and expressed bewilderment that tax economists don’t seem to notice the obviously preferable alternative of Pigouvian taxes on negative exte rnalities. You wrote: “The big puzzle for me: Why do tax economists spend so much time .. MORE
Politics and Economics
Ed Crane: An Appreciation
In yesterday’s mail, I received the last of Ed Crane’s bimonthly memos. The Cato Institute, of which he is CEO until Monday, sends it out to people who contribute at least $100 annually to Cato. I’m writing this to express my appreciation for Ed. I know that it’s common to wait until someone dies before .. MORE
Fiscal Policy
Did the Dot.Com Boom Boost GDP Much?
In my August 26 post, “U.S. Federal Budget Cuts in the 1990s,” I pointed out that U.S. government spending fell from 21.8 percent of GDP in 1990 to 18.4 percent of GDP in 2000, a 3.4-percentage-point drop. I focused on the numerator–government spending–but I did point out that the denominator, GDP, had done nicely too. .. MORE