In 1913, exactly a century ago, the United States was a flourishing, economically advanced country. Its real output per capita was the world’s highest. It produced a great abundance of agricultural products and was a leading exporter of cotton, wheat, and many other farm products. Yet it also had the world’s largest industrial sector,...
Read More »

The Spring 2013 issue of The Independent Review—the Independent Institute’s flagship scholarly journal, edited by Robert Higgs—is hot off the press. Below you’ll find links to articles and book reviews that address a host of intriguing questions: Why have domestic police agencies across the United States resorted increasingly to “no-knock” raids and other military-type...
Read More »

Robert Higgs’ wonderful book, Crisis and Leviathan, says that government grows in response to crises. A crisis comes along and government responds by expanding, both in size and in scope. After the crisis passes, government shrinks, but not back to its former level. Government grows by ratcheting up in response to crises. Rahm Emanuel,...
Read More »

In the age of ceaseless parroting for “transparency,” it’s astounding to me that government do-gooders are apparently immune. The Asbury Park (NJ) Press is reporting: The Sandy relief fund chaired by New Jersey first lady Mary Pat Christie has raised more than $32 million so far. But four months after the superstorm, none of...
Read More »

Who should get a mammogram? At what age? How frequently? What about Pap smears and prostate cancer tests and colonoscopies? Aren’t these questions experts can decide? Unfortunately, no. Any reader of daily newspapers knows that we are forever getting conflicting advice from well-meaning people. Part of the problem is that people differ in their...
Read More »

The populist reaction against Europe’s crisis continues to move south, as exemplified by the astounding success of the Five Star Movement led by comedian Giuseppe Grillo, which became Italy’s largest single party in the recent general elections. An organization that has been in existence for three years, the Five Star Movement has capitalized on...
Read More »

The media are bombarding us with stories of how sequestration, with its “drastic cuts” in government spending, will affect our lives. Marketplace ran one yesterday about the USDA and the potential loss of federal meat inspectors. Don’t worry, we were told, the authorities won’t allow tainted meat on the shelves! But they might inspect...
Read More »

The culmination of last night’s Oscars broadcast with a Live! feed from the White House with Mrs. Obama (hangin’ with her military BFs) marks the official recognition of the Presidency as theater: like the old Western sets, no substance required. From the very beginning, President Obama was elected based on his strong delivery of...
Read More »

The fiscal cliff is in the news again. After (mostly) settling the tax side of the fiscal cliff in January, the big deal now is that if an agreement is not reached prior to Friday, March 1, $85 billion in automatic spending cuts will take effect. That’s the dreaded sequester that has everyone so...
Read More »

Eldridge Cleaver famously declared, “You’re either part of the solution or you’re part of the problem.” Although I did not agree with this sentiment in its original context, it has more definite applicability in regard to what one might think of as “solving political problems.” Notice, first, that politics consists in the struggle to...
Read More »