William Anderson | The Libertarian Institute

Calling Out Paul Krugman’s Booms & Busts

by William Anderson | May 18, 2021 | Economics, Featured Articles

That Austrians and Keynesians do not share many views on economics (or probably anything else) is obvious, so a difference of opinion between the two hardly should surprise anyone. However, it still is important to point out the differences between the two camps, especially at the current time when Keynesians are all the rage in Washington (When did they ever leave?) and especially in the Joe Biden administration and, of course, the editorial pages of the New York Times. Perhaps there is no greater difference between Keynesians and Austrians than their beliefs on economic booms. In short,...

Our Tower of Economic Lies

by William Anderson | May 12, 2021 | Economics, Featured Articles

In a recent issue, Time Magazine boldly declared, “The Free Market Is Dead,” and then added: “What Will Replace It?” Of course, one always can expect Time to be disingenuous at best and dishonest at worst, and as an academic economist, I have come to realize that after reading Time off and on for more than five decades, this is a publication that rarely gets it right when it comes to economic analysis. Yet, we also are dealing with a publication that effectively reflects whatever the current spirit might be. In the mid-1980s, Time gave its readers the infamous cover condemning the...

The Prosecutors Are Coming

by William Anderson | Feb 1, 2021 | Criminal Justice, Featured Articles, Politics

The violent protest at the U.S. Capitol on January 6 has long been over, but the upcoming Biden administration’s response to it is likely to do greater violence to the U.S. Constitution and the rule of law than anything the worst of the protesters could have accomplished. Thanks to the response of the George W. Bush administration and Congress to the 9/11 attacks almost two decades ago, Joe Biden’s prosecutors will have plenty of legal ammunition to go after their political enemies. It won’t stop with prosecuting people who broke into the Capitol. J.D. Tuccille writes: After the 9/11...

Woodrow Wilson: A President Worth ‘Canceling’

by William Anderson | Jul 3, 2020 | Featured Articles

Princeton University has made it official: Woodrow Wilson’s name no longer will have any place on campus. The former president, or at least his memory, now is part of cancel culture, which is sweeping the nation. The Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs will replace the former president’s name with “Princeton,” and Wilson College now will be called First College. This hardly is surprising but in many ways discouraging, but not for reasons that many people might assume. Wilson did, after all, leave a sorry legacy of Jim Crow racial segregation and actively sought to...

Airline Bailouts Destabilize the Economy and Inflate Asset Prices

by William Anderson | Apr 7, 2020 | Economics, Events, Featured Articles

In the end, after all of the political posturing and all of the speeches and exhortations for Congress to “do something,” a $2 trillion “coronavirus stimulus” bill landed on the president’s desk for The Donald to sign. And sign he did, uttering all of the platitudes and everything else that comes with “historic” spending legislation that never should have seen the light of day. Although COVID-19 has helped expose vast weaknesses in public health systems in the USA, it also has shown that with much of corporate America, the emperor has no clothes. Although tracking where the money goes is not...

Socialism Always Fails

by William Anderson | Feb 13, 2020 | Featured Articles

The Nation, which enthusiastically has supported every totalitarian communist regime that has existed in the past century (and that includes Pol Pot’s Cambodia and North Korea) is now firmly riding the Bernie Sanders bandwagon. This article, entitled “Why American Socialism Failed—and How It Could Prevail Today,” unwittingly gives away the mentality of American socialists which claims all economic issues as being “solved” by the implantation of socialism—regardless of the actual economic outcomes. Three years ago, I wrote “The End of Socialists is Socialism, Not Prosperity,” and this article...

Conservatives Are Increasingly Wrong about Free Markets

by William Anderson | Jan 10, 2020 | Economics, Featured Articles, Libertarianism, Politics

Capitalism creates poverty. Capitalism has stolen our future. Capitalism ravages the planet. Capitalism oppresses us. Capitalism needs to be controlled by government or it will throw most of us into poverty and misery and enrich only the well-placed few. These are not missives from The Nation or the Daily Worker, although no doubt the writers from those publications would share the sentiments. No, these diatribes against the market economy come from the American Conservative. Of course, it is hardly the only conservative publication that rails against the market system, as First Things can...

AOC and the Green Great Leap Forward

by William Anderson | Feb 18, 2019 | Featured Articles, Politics

In what its supporters have claimed is “visionary,” the congressional media darling, Alexandria Occasio-Cortez (AOC) has released her short-awaited Green New Deal , and she has called for nothing short of destruction of life as we have known it: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said she has no qualms about acknowledging a so-called “Green New Deal” will mean unprecedented governmental intrusion into the private sector. Appearing on NPR, she was asked if she’s prepared to tell Americans outright that her plans involve “massive government intervention.” On one level, AOC is being honest; such a...