misconceptions and deregulation
Just very briefly – “deregulation” does not mean the stripping away of all rules or the desire to enter into a state of anarchy. So when I speak of “deregulating” the health care industry, I’m mainly...
View ArticleWe’re already at war
James Poulos thinks I’m wrong to advocate against Arthur Brooks’ culture war: Alas, the cultural conflict is already blazing. Some people think a federal tax on tanning is a legitimate tool of economic...
View ArticleOn free markets
[updated] So, just to clarify a position I hold: My belief in free markets is based in the concept of failure. I believe in markets because I believe they allow for failure to occur. Also, I believe in...
View ArticleCapitalism, Anarchy & War
IOZ devotes a bit of time to snarking at that Karl Smith post everyone’s been linking to and talking about: When people say that the job, purpose, goal, intent, etc. of something is to do something...
View ArticleMarket liberals
Matt Yglesias makes tons of sense with his latest foray into an ongoing debate between him and John Quiggin and others. I think Matt operates in that awkward position of being not-progressive-enough...
View ArticleStocks collapse, threaten to go even lower than our opinion of Congress
Here’s Krugman: It’s not the whole story, but something like this threatens to develop: 1. US debt is downgraded, sparking demands for more ill-advised fiscal austerity 2. Fears that this austerity...
View ArticleOptimism Inc.
Me: Not to sound like too much of an optimist – because resource depletion does keep me up nights, too – but I do think innovation and green technology and new ways of crafting our cities, our...
View ArticleSocial Forces and Vulgar Libertarianism
Will Wilkinson makes an important observation about the affinity between libertarians and conservatives. At the heart of the fusionism between the two groups, he explains, is the notion of individual...
View ArticleMarkets Are The New Culture
I do love A Bit of Fry & Laurie. This is quite a brilliant sketch, whatever you make of its politics. Maybe not quite as good as their free-market-police bit, but right up there. Of course, market...
View ArticleLemonade, Taxis, Victims and a Comment Rescue or Two
In a recent post by Tod about privilege, a discussion emerged regarding the role of government in providing privilege via the enforcement of monopolies. As noted, such privilege does not just belong to...
View ArticleSeparation (Due To) Anxiety?
At some point in the mid-Aughts, maybe ’06 or so, there circulated among the blogs I read a graphic representation of the interconnectedness of the various topical galaxies in the blogging universe (it...
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