As expected by many economists, the Homebuyer Tax Credit did little to nothing to encourage new home purchases and only shifted the purchase of new homes from May to April. Howard Gleckman over at the Tax Policy Center reports on the waste and fraud afforded by deficit financed public policy of this sort, noting...
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I recently read the revised edition of Thomas Sowell’s excellent The Housing Boom and Bust. One of the most striking things about the role of housing in the financial crisis is the resonance of the “villains, victims, and valiant government” narrative that goes as follows: greedy bankers exploited everyone while the regulators were asleep...
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With the Securities and Exchange Commission now accusing Goldman Sachs of fraud by selling investors mortgage-backed securities that eventually collapsed, one might wonder whether Goldman did, in fact, set up Abacus investments anticipating that it would lose money. This article suggests there were divided opinions within Goldman. Of course, companies don’t take any actions...
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I was interviewed recently by Angel Martin for Libertad Digital, an interesting Spanish website. The interview was posted today. Topics discussed include the recent financial debacle, the current recession, the government’s recent policy actions, and several related, more general subjects, such as “regime uncertainty” and U.S. foreign policy. For those who might be interested...
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In the 1980s, left-liberals talked about homelessness as a plague and human rights issue. It has been over a decade since I’ve even heard about homeless people as a political issue. Now the victim class is the middle class. The Democrats and Republicans both talk about shoring up the middle class with targeted tax...
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You might have read the story about the Socialist Alarm Clock. Here’s one version. A friend who wishes to remain anonymous sent his libertarian version and asked me to post it: This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock built by the ingenuity of millions of individuals all working for their own gain,...
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Last week, Robert Higgs appeared on the “Mike Church Show.” If you missed it, you can check it out here.

Many commentators would have us believe that the economy hit bottom in the second quarter of 2009, and afterward commenced a recovery, albeit a “jobless” one, as employment continued to decline. The main reason for believing in this recovery seems to be that real gross domestic product (GDP) reached a trough in the second...
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Not everyone has the stomach for perusing the national income and product accounts, but one who does can learn a great deal about what ails the present economy and about its prospects for returning to a healthier condition. (I draw the data I discuss here from Table B-2, “Real gross domestic product, 1960-2009,” in the...
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Syndicated columnist and bestselling author Dave Barry’s provides an incisive and hilarious, month-by-month review of the year 2009, “Dave Barry’s year in review: 2009.” As he begins: It was a year of Hope—at first in the sense of “I feel hopeful!” and later in the sense of “I hope this year ends soon!” It...
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