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Tariff Advocates Rarely Talk About How Tariffs Punish Consumers

Politicians who support tariffs and other forms of government intervention in the economy frequently emphasize reshoring, trade deficits, cheap imports, and national security, but they rarely talk about consumers.

Journalists and Economics 101

Journalists and Economics 101

Is deficit spending "a potent recession cure when administered properly"? A newspaper business writer made this assertion in an article entitled "The Budget Deficit Faced by Many States." But is it true, that it's a good thing when governments spend more than they...

AOL Antitrust Suit Against Microsoft

Instead of straightening out its business problems, AOL has decided to spend its time and effort filing lawsuits against tough competitors – a petty, distracting pursuit that won’t help AOL or, for that matter, the U.S. economy, which depends on firms like Microsoft for the innovation necessary to bring about a technology revival.

Activism in Defense of Microsoft

Activism in Defense of Microsoft

For over four years, CMDC and its supporters have been outspoken advocates against antitrust and the current antitrust case against Microsoft. Before us today is the last chance to tell the government regulators that Microsoft should be lauded, instead of punished for...

Barriers To Entry

Barriers To Entry

How badly flawed are the concepts of freedom of entry, monopoly, and competition that underlie the theory and practice of antitrust.

What is Economics?

What is Economics?

To know what economics is, we must first know what an economy is. Perhaps most of us think of an economy as a system for the production and distribution of the goods and services we use in everyday life. That is true as far as it goes, but it does not go far enough....

A Dynamite Economics Department

Reporting their findings in the February 2001 Applied Economics Letters -- a British professional journal -- Professors Franklin G. Mixon Jr. and Kamal P. Upadhyaya rank economics departments in the U.S. South. The rankings are based upon faculty research...

The Economics of War

National emergencies are notorious for giving free reign to bad economics. In the panic of a crisis, people grasp desperately for solutions. And thanks to generations of bad economics education, they are offered a wide range of economic errors to grasp at. The most...

Forty Centuries of Wage and Price Controls

Forty Centuries of Wage and Price Controls

Even the Department of Energy's study found that price caps -- which, let's not forget, are what got California into this mess in the first place -- won't improve the energy situation. In fact, they'll likely make it worse. The study concluded that a $150 "hard cap"...

The “Trickle Down” Economics Straw Man

The “Trickle Down” Economics Straw Man

Among the suggestions being made for getting the American economy moving up again is a reduction in the capital gains tax. But any such suggestion makes people on the left go ballistic. It is "trickle down" economics, they cry. Liberals claim that those who favor tax...

What is Economics?

What is Economics?

To know what economics is, we must first know what an economy is. Perhaps most of us think of an economy as a system for the production and distribution of the goods and services we use in everyday life. That is true as far as it goes, but it does not go far enough....

Housing and Overpopulation: Shocked by the Obvious

Housing and Overpopulation: Shocked by the Obvious

The obvious makes headlines in California. Maybe this shows that a sense of reality or common sense is not something that can be taken for granted among Californians. A recent headline stretching across the top of the front page announced that "Population dwarfs...

How Microsoft Competes

How Microsoft Competes

Beside Bill Gates, what does Microsoft have that contributes to their success? The authors spent a couple of years trying to find out. Their conclusions: seven complementary strategies and a small set of basic principals of operation. First, find smart people who know...

Free Trade with a Slave State?

Q: Should a free country trade with people who live under a dictatorship (e.g. China, Cuba)? And, if not, should the government of the free country restrict such trade with dictatorships? A: If you enjoy living in a free country, then you benefit from that freedom...

Basic Economics

Dr. Thomas Sowell has just released his latest treasure -- it's title is "Basic Economics." Reading through the book reminded me of a 30-plus-year-old conversation I had with Professor Armen Alchian, one of my tenacious mentors during my graduate training at UCLA....

Price Controls and the Electricity Crisis in California

Price Controls and the Electricity Crisis in California

It was only a passing news item when the financial information service Standard & Poor's lowered the rating it gave to bonds issued by the state of California. But it has big implications and it also shows the big difference between economics and politics. At the...

Let There Be Free Trade

Leaders of 34 American countries are meeting this weekend in Quebec City at the Summit of the Americas to discuss the establishment of a free trade zone extending from Canada to Chile. A Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) is a top priority of the Bush...

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