Gary Galles | The Libertarian Institute

Democratic Socialism: Mob Rule by the Ignorant

by Gary Galles | Apr 20, 2022 | Featured Articles

Why is politics so negative compared to marketing — its analog in the private sector — even though virtually every candidate echoes the desire to "just get along"? The explanation revolves around two important ways political competition differs from market competition: higher payoffs to negative attacks, and rationally ignorant "customers." Selling your product in the private sector requires a customer to cast an affirmative vote to buy it. Just convincing a potential customer that a rival product should not be purchased does not mean a sale for you. This is because a sales prospect can...

Drop Your Left vs Right Blinders

by Gary Galles | Jan 3, 2022 | Featured Articles, Libertarianism

As a libertarian, I have long objected to being characterized on a left-right political spectrum (as with studies of political affiliations that group libertarians with republicans or conservatives on the right). In response to inquiries about where I fit in that framework, over the years, I have taken to saying that my views were orthogonal (meaning at right angles or perpendicular) to the framework. Since almost no one knows what that word means, those I say it to are puzzled, and ask for clarification, which allows me to explain why I fit in neither category. I had done that for years...

How Government Jobs Hurt the Economy

by Gary Galles | May 24, 2021 | Economics, Featured Articles

It seems that every time something adverse happens in the labor market, it restarts the partisan battle between those currently in and out of power as to who is a better steward of the economy. That was illustrated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics's (BLS) release of the job numbers for April, which made headlines when job growth, which was expected to surge, came in “unexpectedly” low. The 266,000 jobs created were only a quarter of some forecasts, which topped 1 million. Further, March job creation was also revised down by 146,000. And unemployment ticked up for the first time since the...

Why Central Planning by Medical Experts Will Lead to Disaster

by Gary Galles | Apr 10, 2020 | Economics, Events, Featured Articles

A great deal of the coverage of the COVID-19 crisis has been apocalyptic. That is partly because “if it bleeds, it leads.” But it is also because some of the medical experts with media megaphones have put forward potentially catastrophic scenarios and drastic plans to deal with them, reinforced by assertions that the rest of us should “listen to the experts,” because only they know enough to determine policy. Unfortunately, those experts don’t know enough to determine appropriate policies. Doctors, infectious disease specialists, epidemiologists, etc. know more things about diseases, their...

Why America’s Founders Didn’t Want a Democracy

by Gary Galles | Dec 18, 2019 | Featured Articles, Libertarianism

In his book "Liberty in Peril," Randall Holcombe challenges the presumption that liberty and democracy are complementary. When I took history and government in school, many critical issues were misrepresented, given short shrift, or even ignored entirely. And those lacunae undermined my ability to adequately understand many things. Randall Holcombe’s new book, Liberty in Peril: Democracy and Power in American History, fills in some very substantial gaps, particularly with regard to American constitutionalism and how it has morphed from protecting liberty to advancing democracy at the expense...

The Income Tax: Still the Root of All Evil

by Gary Galles | Feb 26, 2019 | Economics, Featured Articles

February 25 is a momentous day in American history. It is the day in 1913 the 16th Amendment, authorizing a federal income tax, took effect with the certification of Secretary of State Philander C. Knox. Because of the crucial effects the income tax has had on America, one would hope that there would be some serious discussion of it in the media. But that hope is routinely disappointed. But serious consideration of the effects of the income tax has occurred. For example, in his 1954 book, The Income Tax: Root of All Evil, Frank Chodorov showed how the abrogation of citizens’ property rights...

Medicare for All: Administrative Costs Are Much Higher than You Think

by Gary Galles | Dec 6, 2018 | Featured Articles, Politics

Even before the new Congress has been seated, some emboldened progressives are pushing for votes to establish Medicare for all. Bernie Sanders argues that 70 percent of Americans favor it, so now is the time. Of course, that support plummets when people are told about its astronomical tax bill and its escalation in government control. But Sanders insists that it will happen because, as the Los Angeles Times described his argument, “the bottom line is that less money will come out of American pockets to pay for healthcare.” Unfortunately for that argument, its basis — that turning from an...

Peace, Harmony, and Free Trade: 10 Uplifting Quotes by Richard Cobden, the Shining Knight of Classical Liberalism

by Gary Galles | Jun 5, 2018 | Economics, Featured Articles

June 3rd marks the 1804 birth of “the Apostle of Free Trade,” Richard Cobden. He earned that name spearheading the campaign against England’s protectionist Corn Laws, whose repeal in 1846 spread liberalized trade through much of Europe. Some have said free markets owe him their existence. Cobden recognized free trade as the key to creating material prosperity. But far more, he emphasized the moral superiority of free trade over the injustice of protectionism, in which government uses its power to help one group by unjustifiably harming others. Further, he saw that markets’ exclusively...