I was taught in school that free trade was inherently good, because it provided the most efficient method of producing material goods and services, taking advantage of each country’s comparative advantage. But, what if our modern global economy has erased any notion that a comparative advantage exists today? Continue Reading »
What does the Carrier deal mean for limited-government politics? How can principled conservatives accommodate themselves to Trump’s scrambling of political categories? Continue Reading »
The global system—which is committed to the free flow of labor, goods, and capital—works well for the leadership class in Europe and North America, as it does for striving workers in China, India, and elsewhere. It doesn’t work so well for the middle class in the West. Thus, in the West, the led no longer share the economic interests of their leaders. Continue Reading »
The word “entrepreneurship” hardly was spoken during the recent Republican primaries. That is disturbing, because the empirical evidence argues strongly that today’s capitalism is more “clotted” and more “complacent” than at any time for which we have data. Continue Reading »
It was never about small government. That is the bitter lesson many conservatives have learned, as they have seen Republican-leaning voters opt for a candidate who promises mass deportations and protectionism. That’s the bad news. The good news is that, when conservatives were winning, they were . . . . Continue Reading »
Over at the Guardian, Paul Mason writes about the disintegration of Britain's working class. The occasion is the publication of a report on educational achievement, analyzed in terms of the ethnicity of pupils. It turns out that white British kids fall behind during their school years, with . . . . Continue Reading »
The science of economics has undoubtedly come a long way since the days of Adam Smith, but economic discussions today can often seem downright strange, if not misleading. One case in point is the focus on the concept of utility, as one prominent economic blog recently did—with far-reaching . . . . Continue Reading »
Donald Trump ascribing responsibility for his first two failed marriages to working “like, twenty-two hours a day” brought to mind Adam Smith’s invocation of the “invisible hand” in his 1759 work, The Theory of Moral Sentiments. There, the invisible hand is not quite the same general . . . . Continue Reading »
At the Crossroads” was ostensibly a conservative gathering in Austin to discuss energy and “so-called global warming” as Senator Ted Cruz put it, but at its core was a celebration of cornucopianism. That progressive philosophy sees an ever improving world flowing from the mind of man and the . . . . Continue Reading »