The great news for humanity: Economic freedom around the world is on the rise. This means liberation for millions and billions of people. What a change from 20 years ago, when so many lived under despotism and socialist slavery. These people are freer, and getting freer. More people avail themselves to the global division of […]
Laissez-Faire Today
What Is Bernanke Really Thinking?
Why a third round of quantitative easing? Sure, Ben Bernanke says that it is all about jobs and growth, as shown by various 60-year theories pushed by Lord Keynes. Really? Let’s get serious. This approach has done nothing over five years. It has prolonged the suffering. Another round virtually guarantees continued economic stagnation. QE is […]
Rachel Carson and the Bed Bugs
A month ago, a family I know returned from a trip in which they stayed in an ordinary hotel off the interstate in Virginia. They arrived late and left the next morning. The parents slept in the bed while the kids slept on the sleeper sofa. The kids had red welts all over their faces […]
Give the Gift of Liberty
You know the cliches: It’s a small world after all We are the world. Globalism rules Earth is our neighborhood now and every citizen is a next-door neighbor. All that’s more or less true in the digital sector. I’ve emailed and texted using translation programs that allow me to speak with people in languages I […]
The Bernanke of the 18th Century
Central banks around the world are ramping up money production to revive their economies. What should investors do? It’s easy, according to Jeff Kilburg, founder and CEO of Killir Kapital Management. His advice is to buy. Buy what? Almost anything. “Analysts? They can go on vacation at least until after Christmas,” Kilburg says. “You can […]
To Build a Better Can Opener
“How the heck does this thing work?” I struggled with the new can opener for 20 minutes before giving up. This thing doesn’t work. Has the government wrecked the can opener too? Hmmm, maybe I should read the instructions. I had done the “guy thing” and attempted to use a new product without bothering to […]
TAG, You’re It
You probably don’t realize this, but your finances are standing behind more than a trillion dollars of the bank deposits of large corporations and municipalities housed at America’s largest banks. It all began in 2008, as it usually does. During the crash, the FDIC instituted the TAG (Transaction Account Guarantee) program. TAG provides UNLIMITED coverage […]
The Truth Behind the Romney “Gaffe”
Cover the kids’ ears! Hide their eyes! Shuffle the weak and frail from the room! A politician running for president has uttered a heresy that brings into question the holy grail of democratic politics. Romney has failed to pretend as if the country is one big happy family that uses our glorious voting system to […]
Five Deadly Effects of QE3
In announcing QE3, Ben Bernanke’s words betrayed not the slightest doubt that this is the right thing. More Fed bond purchases, combined with three more years of zero interest rates, he said, will quicken economic growth and cause unemployment to fall. And the punditry class all nodded in unison. I know that this is government […]
Gadget Mania: May It Never End
What kind of events are worth reporting on in real time, with updates every few seconds? Such events have to be pretty dramatic. Well, the release of the iPhone 5 apparently qualifies. The tech blogs were all over it, and so were the wire services and big papers. A moment to celebrate? Sure! It was […]