The most important question for asset prices right now, from stocks to houses to Bitcoin, is whether we’re due for a recession. Last week we got confirmation that according to the traditional definition of a recession—two quarters of negative growth—we are already in...
Economics
A Prize System as a Solution to Drug Patents
by Dakota Hensley | Aug 10, 2022 | Economics, Featured Articles
Drugs are expensive. A vial of insulin can be up to $250 and a pack of pens can be up to $500. Every month, many families decide between life and food. For a country as rich as ours this is a disgrace and a moral crime. The culprit is the pharmaceutical monopoly. With...
After a National Divorce, Where Does the Debt Go?
by Ryan McMaken | Aug 4, 2022 | Economics, Featured Articles
The topic of secession has become increasing more common in recent years as various regions and minority populations (e.g., California and Texas) has openly suggested breaking away from the United States. The idea is forwarded with varying levels of seriousness, but...
The Fake China Threat and Its Very Real Danger
by Joseph Solis-Mullen | Jul 25, 2022 | Economics, Featured Articles, Foreign Policy
From the front pages of The Washington Post and Wall Street Journal, Foreign Affairs, the Economist, to The New York Times’ Best Sellers List; from CNN and MSNBC to FOX and NEWSMAX; from think tanks to Pentagon planners, congressional testimonies and White House...
The Patent, an Enemy of Innovation
by Dakota Hensley | Jul 21, 2022 | Economics, Featured Articles
The foundation of our economy is the patent. If you invent something, you need a patent. We assume that without patent law, society would be stuck in an economic malaise. We'd be stuck in the Dark Ages. However, that isn't true. The opposite is. Patents hold our...
Inflation Hits 40-Year High at 9.1%
by Ryan McMaken | Jul 14, 2022 | Economics, Featured Articles
The U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics released new Consumer Price Index inflation estimates this morning, and the official numbers for June 2022 show that price inflation has risen to 9.1 percent year over year. That's the biggest number since November 1981, when the...
Living With the Cuban Revolution, 60 Years Later
by Carlos Martinez | Jul 12, 2022 | Economics, Featured Articles
In his book Anarchy, State, and Utopia, Robert Nozick has a chapter named "The Tale of the Slave" in which he explains the nine phases from the most restrictive to more liberating states of slavery. He writes that even though enslaved people have certain forms of...
Richard Cobden on the Link between Free Trade and Peace
by Sheldon Richman | Jul 12, 2022 | Blog, Economics, Foreign Policy, Justice, Libertarianism, Politics
I see in the Free-trade principle that which shall act on the moral world as the principle of gravitation in the universe,—drawing men together, thrusting aside the antagonism of race, and creed, and language, and uniting us in the bonds of eternal peace. I have...