Recycling Discredited Ideas

APRIL 01, 2009 by PETER LEWIN

The current financial crisis has fueled a frenzied recycling of discredited Keynesian ideas. We are hearing again of the need for "public works," of the need to "stimulate" the economy. The Federal Reserve is frantically inflating the supply of money. We are laying the groundwork for a disaster reminiscent of the 1970s—if not worse.

A Microeconomist's Protest

APRIL 01, 2009 by MARIO RIZZO

The conventional macroeconomic diagnosis and proposed cures ignore many important structural or microeconomic factors.

Too Big to Succeed

APRIL 01, 2009 by LESS ANTMAN

One widely cited culprit for the 2008 financial crisis was a supposed decision by the U.S. government not to regulate a relatively new type of financial instrument known as a credit default swap (CDS). In fact, this so-called "failure to regulate" refers to regulations that prohibited public trading of these instruments, concentrated risk in a small number of large firms, and massively increased the probability of a financial disaster. To add to the irony, one of the government officials most responsible for these interventions, then-Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, recently apologized for having had too much faith in the free market when he should have apologized for not having had enough.

The Trouble with Keynes

Focusing on the macro.

APRIL 01, 2009 by ROGER W. GARRISON

Keynesian theory implies an inherent instability in market economies. Thus the theory cannot possibly explain how a healthy market economy functions—how the market process allows one kind of activity to be traded off against the other.

Somalia: Failed State, Economic Success?

APRIL 01, 2009 by BENJAMIN POWELL

By most measures Somalia has improved living standards faster than the average sub-Saharan African country since the government of Siad Barre collapsed in the early 1990s.

Paul Krugman Flunks Capital Theory

APRIL 01, 2009 by SHELDON RICHMAN

T. Boone Pickens is Right About Oil Imports? It Just Ain't So!

APRIL 01, 2009 by E. FRANK STEPHENSON

The $700 billion that Americans spend annually to purchase oil from other countries (according to Pickens) is a price not a transfer. For the $700 billion we send to oil exporters, we get something in return—oil. Our receipt of millions of barrels of oil in exchange for that money is hardly a transfer. We receive a versatile commodity that can be used for everything from making plastics to fueling family vacations. The exporters receive the $700 billion that they can then use to purchase other goods and services.

Madoff is a Piker

Madoff's Scam Was Small Compared to U.S. Government's Two Ponzi Schemes

APRIL 01, 2009 by JOHN STOSSEL

Where Does Your Vote Really Count?

Your Dollar Votes Always Count in the Free Market

APRIL 01, 2009 by WALTER E. WILLIAMS