"That there is inequality of ability or monetary income on the free market should surprise no one. As we have seen above, men are not 'equal' in their tastes, interests, abilities, or locations. Resources are not distributed “equally” over the earth.16 This inequality...
Economics
Revisiting Rothbard’s Argument on Tariffs
by Joseph Solis-Mullen | Feb 6, 2025 | Economics, Featured Articles
As American consumers and businesses face the looming possibility of additional tariffs under a second Trump administration, it is worth revisiting the incisive critique of protectionism put forth by economist Murray Rothbard in his book Power and Market. Rothbard’s...
The Economics of Deadwood
by Joseph Solis-Mullen | Jan 23, 2025 | Economics, Featured Articles
California’s catastrophic wildfires have become an annual tragedy. Beyond the devastation they bring to communities and ecosystems, these fires are a powerful metaphor for the unintended consequences of human intervention in natural systems. A primary culprit in...
A Libertarian-Left Alliance…On Economics?
by Thomas Eddlem | Jan 20, 2025 | Economics, Featured Articles, Politics
It sounds silly; a libertarian-left alliance on economics? It's almost like the wolf and the sheep allying on what’s for dinner. But hear me out. There’s a global political realignment in the works, and it’s clearly based on stopping the military-industrial complex,...
TGIF: The H-1B Controversy
by Sheldon Richman | Jan 17, 2025 | Economics, Featured Articles, Justice, Sheldon Richman, TGIF
Does anyone still believe that the market process should set prices, including wages? Apparently not. Take the controversy surrounding the H-1B visa, the program that "permits" employers to hire highly educated and skilled foreign workers, such as hi-tech personnel....
Privatization (When It’s Not)
by Owen Ashworth | Jan 15, 2025 | Economics, Featured Articles
For the first time in Royal Mail’s long history, stretching back to the 1500s, its owner will be based overseas. Daniel Kretinsky, a Czech billionaire, has acquired ownership over Royal Mail after a £3.6bn takeover. Royal Mail has been performing badly for years now...
Production Is Spiritual, Not Material
by Sheldon Richman | Jan 14, 2025 | Blog, Economics
"Production is not an act of creation; it does not bring about something that did not exist before. It is a transformation of given elements through arrangement and combination. The producer is not a creator. Man is creative only in thinking and in the realm of...
The Illusion of Wartime Prosperity
by Joseph Solis-Mullen | Jan 14, 2025 | Economics, Featured Articles, Foreign Policy
That war is of benefit to the business of voluntary exchange to mutual benefit is, as one of the last British bearers of the classical liberal flame, Norman Angell, remarked in 1909, the great illusion. Certainly there were some industries that gained, such as the...