Mises Search

According to  this story in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the price of flu vaccines has more than quintupled. So what’s the problem?  Entrepreneurs are allocating resources to the uses that bring people the greatest benefit. They should be applauded for doing so, right? But this isn’t the case. According to several sources quoted in the article,

Here’s an  insightful, short commentary on the state of the environment: we may not be sowing the seeds of our own doom, but the very thought of it is enough to grab headlines (and loads of taxpayer cash). Naturally, the environmental crisis (which doesn’t exist) requires massive government intervention (which won’t help) since “environmental

Surprise, surprise: the  New York Times doesn’t approve of one of Bush’s “ideologically motivated” judicial nominees.  They criticize the nominee’s refusal to adhere to modern legal tradition—namely, the tradition holding that the state is the wellspring of human progress—and for having the audacity to suggest that “well-intentioned” government

Wendy McElroy makes a string of good points about homeschooling in this column from Foxnews.com . Certainly, state education has failed the least of these among us. But here’s another idea. Everyone knows that crime is out of control. Crime is usually traced to poverty, lackluster education, and lack of opportunity. So let’s open up some

WASHINGTON—Amid concerns about a declining industrial base and outsourcing of high-tech jobs to low-wage countries, a bill to repeal both the Law of Comparative Advantage and the Law of Demand passed both houses of Congress Thursday with near-unanimous bipartisan support . “The message is simple: freedom works,” a jubilant Republican House Speaker

Most sports fans know that the St. Louis Rams were the beneficiaries of one of the greatest tax dollar giveaways of the 1990s.  The deal was based on the theory of public goods as it applies to pro sports: arenas are public goods because of non-appropriable, pareto-relevant externalities that they generate.  And so the government should build

Now  this is brilliant politics : everyone is fascinated with outer space, The Great Unknown, the Final Frontier, and all that...and it has the added benefit of distracting the country from the Democratic primaries. However, the article fails to mention an important question: why? What purpose is served by putting a base on the moon or by

The New York Times has editorialized in favor of mandatory country-of-origin labeling for “our food supply” on the grounds that consumers allegedly a) want to know where their food comes from and b) would prefer to “buy American” if they knew it were an option. There is certainly nothing wrong with wanting to buy American, and you can bet your

Lou Dobbs says , “America can no longer afford the price of “free” trade.” In addition, he says: Most Americans would like to support domestic manufacturers by buying U.S.-made products, but chances are that most of us own goods made predominantly outside the United States. Wal-Mart alone imported $12 billion in goods last year from China.

The ongoing debate between Paul Craig Roberts and other Mises Institute scholars is indeed stimulating.  Roberts & Schumer have a point in that ours is a world of near-perfect capital mobility and rapidly advancing information technology; therefore, it is a world of rapid economic change.  Removing trade barriers results in near-instantaneous