Farm subsidies are a way the government achieves artificially high prices. They are an illustration of legal minimum prices—that is, prices below which the government prevents the producers from selling.
MARKETS
Antitrust Lawsuit Against PGA is Unfounded
Eleven professional golfers, including Phil Mickelson, have filed an anti-trust lawsuit against the Professional Golf Association (PGA).
Inflation: John Maynard Keynes vs. The Gold Standard (3 of 5)
The government may think that inflation--as a method of raising funds--is better than taxation, which is always unpopular and difficult. In many rich and great nations, legislators have often discussed, for months and months, the various forms of new taxes that were...
An Unnecessary Evil: How Canada Ended Up Insuring Bank Deposits
If Canada’s relatively “free” banking system was so stable, why did the Canadian government establish the Bank of Canada in 1935? And why did it establish a Canadian Deposit Insurance Corporation (CDIC) some three decades later?
The Profit Motive as an Agent of Innovation and Progress, Part 2
The operation of the tendency toward a uniform rate of profit requires that high profits be made by continuously introducing productive innovations in advance of competitors.
Confusions about Capitalism
Three common accusations against capitalism are that it is exploitation, it is cronyism, and it destroys the planet.
The Lottery Life: Creating Lucky Housing Winners at the Expense of Everyone Else
End the “Lottery Life” in housing and watch market entrepreneurs do the rest.
The Profit Motive as an Agent of Innovation and Progress, Part 1
How the profit motive acts to make production steadily increase in a free market, and becomes an agent of continuous economic progress.
Inflation: The Myth of the “Price Level” (2 of 5)
When people talk of a "price level," they have in mind the image of a level of a liquid which goes up or down according to the increase or decrease in its quantity, but which, like a liquid in a tank, always rises evenly. But with prices, there is no such thing as a...
Inflation: An Increase in the Quantity of Money (1 of 5)
If the supply of caviar were as plentiful as the supply of potatoes, the price of caviar--that is, the exchange ratio between caviar and money or caviar and other commodities-would change considerably. In that case, one could obtain caviar at a much smaller...
A Case Study in Nuisance
Nuisance is highly contextual. An action that constitutes a nuisance in one context may not be a nuisance in another context.
Capitalism’s Visible Hand: Profit Seeking Benefits Consumers in a Free Market
The real advocates of the consumers—their virtual agents—are businessmen seeking profit, not the leaders of groups trying to restrict the freedom of businessmen to earn profits.
The Lust for Power and Tenant’s Rights
Economic power is founded on voluntary trade. Political power is founded on physical force.
Capitalism’s Visible Hand: Production for Profit is Production for Use
In total opposition to the misguided efforts of the Marxists to contrast production for profit with “production for use,” the fact is that production for profit is production for use.
Interventionism vs Capitalism: The Myth of the “Third-way” (4 of 4)
The idea that there is a third system — between socialism and capitalism, as its supporters say — a system as far away from socialism as it is from capitalism but that retains the advantages and avoids the disadvantages of each — is pure nonsense.
Rental Lease Options: Unattractive Alternatives Isn’t Force
We may not always like the alternatives that we face, but choosing between unattractive alternatives isn’t force.
Affordable Housing: The Costs of Democracy in California
On the one hand, housing advocates and public officials decry the state’s housing shortage. On the other hand, they continue to advocate for more controls and restrictions to be piled onto the shoulders of housing producers.
Capitalism’s Visible Hand: How Profit Allocates Capital Across Industries
The uniformity-of-profit principle explains how the activities of all the separate business enterprises are harmoniously coordinated so that capital is not invested excessively in the production of some items while leaving the production of other items unprovided for.
The Progressive Framework is Anti-individual
The Progressive framework relegates the individual to second-class status. The collective reigns supreme.
Capitalism’s Visible Hand: The Uniformity of Profit Principle
The best way to begin to understand the functioning of the price system, and thus the full nature of the dependence of the division of labor on capitalism, is by understanding the following very simple and fundamental principle. Namely, there is a tendency in a free market toward the establishment of a uniform rate of profit on capital invested in all the different branches of industry.
Interventionism vs Capitalism: A Historical Example (3 of 4)
Analyzing interventionism during the First World War in Germany and England.
Art Laffer: “Antitrust Laws Will Make Inflation Worse”
Laffer pours ice cold water on Amy Klobuchar’s plans for a “hot antitrust summer.”
Biden Scapegoats ‘Mom and Pop’ Gas Station Owners For Rising Gas Prices
More than 60 percent of retail gas stations are establishments singularly owned by a family or an individual. And while the number has undoubtedly changed over the last decade, 2013 Census data reported that 61 percent of those stations are owned by immigrants.
The Perpetual Tragedy of New York’s Rent Control
“In many cases rent control appears to be the most efficient technique presently known to destroy a city — except for bombing.”