Article Archive
Could California Make a Comeback?
An unexpected glimmer of hope might cast a new light on the Golden State.
The Looming Student Loan Crisis
Failure to scrutinize employment income contributed to the housing crisis and now threatens student loans, which total more than $1 trillion.
Money Printing Isn’t Always Inflationary
Republicans are wrongly giving fear of money printing a higher priority than the growth debate. Robust growth is as close as we can get to a panacea for our monetary and fiscal problems.
Want Jobs? Try Advanced Manufacturing
By itself, the U.S. manufacturing sector would be the tenth-largest economy in the world, and there is growing concern among U.S. manufacturers about finding enough skilled workers to fuel its continued expansion.
More Subsidies for Prosperous Farmers
In the face of deficits not seen since World War II, we should question proposals to provide billions of taxpayer dollars to support an industry that is enjoying record profits.
Increasing Distortions and Feeding Leviathan: The Internet Sales Tax
A policy shift that weakens the link between taxes imposed and benefits received by definition yields wealth transfers, and the vast array of perverse incentives attendant upon them.
10 Lessons from Cyprus
Here are the likely lessons future historians will draw from Cyprus’s sorry experience in the euro.
The Federal Financial Triangle
What would it mean for the world’s principal central bank to have negative net worth?
Greed Is Green: How the Profit Motive Helps the Environment
The search for increased profitability has long delivered both economic and environmental improvements by promoting the evermore efficient use of material resources.
When Saving Is a Problem Not a Virtue
The Obama administration’s proposed limits on ‘reasonable’ retirement savings would penalize success and patience in favor of the nebulous concept of fairness.
Why Expanding Social Security Is a Bad Idea
A New America Foundation proposal would cost 3.7 percent of GDP and crowd out the private saving that drives our economy.
A ‘Genius’ Way to Avoid Taxes
Nobel Prize laureates are avoiding heavy taxes on their prize money via a loophole that benefits charities. President Obama and former vice president Al Gore both gave away their prize money — at the expense of the IRS.
The Penalties of Our Tax Code
Our tax system’s unnecessary complexity creates unfairness and uncertainty. With a few reforms, it could be more growth-friendly, simple, and fair.
Regulating Risk
An illustration of the impact of financial regulation on capital allocation is the extent to which the world's savings have been attracted to long-term instruments with low yields.
Confusing Cause and Effect in the Fiscal Policy Debate
Our debate should not be about income redistribution or debt reduction but rather about how to achieve broadly shared growth — because when we achieve that, history shows that the deficit and the middle class will benefit.
Lessons from a Feminist Paradise on Equal Pay Day
Sweden seems to be an egalitarian, feminist utopia. So why are American women ahead of their Swedish counterparts in breaking through the glass ceiling?
Financial Innovation — Illusory and Real
Some ‘innovations’ are merely new names for ways of lowering credit standards, running up leverage, and increasing risk. How do we know what’s real and what’s not?
Grow the Economy through Small Businesses
The majority of private sector job growth is from small businesses, and reforming licensing requirements is a promising route to increased business formation.
The Next Real Estate Bubble: Farmland
Farmers have been taking on mounting debt, creating an unsustainable increase in land prices and risking a crash that would ripple through our economy.
Cyprus’s Imminent Collapse
Any calm bought by the IMF-EU bailout package for Cyprus will be short-lived. Cyprus is all but certain to experience an economic collapse over the next two years, and the country will again question whether it should remain in the euro.