George W. Bush’s bullhorn speech still echoes, ‘I can hear you! The rest…
11 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in defence economics, economics of crime, International law, law and economics, laws of war, politics - USA, war and peace Tags: war against terror
‘Incomplete Contracts and the Theory of Contract Design,’ by Robert Scott and George Triantis
11 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economics of information, economics of regulation, history of economic thought, industrial organisation, law and economics, property rights
Economists and lawyers know that almost every contract is incomplete. Contracts routinely omit or leave undefined important terms, and they rarely anticipate every circumstance that might frustrate performance. The reason is simple: It makes little sense to spend $1,000 drafting a provision that has an expected value of only $100. Parties therefore leave lower-value contingencies…
‘Incomplete Contracts and the Theory of Contract Design,’ by Robert Scott and George Triantis
The case for unilateral recognition
11 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economics of information, economics of regulation, industrial organisation, international economic law, international economics, politics - Australia, politics - New Zealand, regulation
Bilateral, plurilateral, and multilateral are words that New Zealand’s civil service love. There is nothing that can’t be improved by doing it in concert with others. Sometimes there’s good reason for just doing stuff. New Zealand made the right decision when it unilaterally slashed all of its tariffs. It also progressed all the other trade agreements that helped…
The case for unilateral recognition
Poll: Almost 60 Percent of Democrats Have a Favorable View of Socialism
11 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in economic history, history of economic thought, liberalism, Marxist economics, politics - USA
Recent polls show steady growth in support for socialism among Democrats. A new CBS poll shows how popular it is,…
Poll: Almost 60 Percent of Democrats Have a Favorable View of Socialism
Economic Scenarios for Transformative AI
10 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economic growth, industrial organisation, macroeconomics Tags: creative destruction
By Anton Korinek, Charles I. Jones, Szymon Sacher, Tess Cotter, and Peter McCrory, a strong line-up from Anthropic. They are sober, reasoned, scientific, and (for the most part) dynamically consistent. Here is the paper, here is the abstract: This paper presents a framework for assessing the economic consequences of AI between 2026 and 2030. In…
Economic Scenarios for Transformative AI
They’re anti-immigration, not Nazis
10 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in income redistribution, labour economics, labour supply, politics, Public Choice Tags: Germany
A lot of media reporting on the election result in Saxony-Arnholt. It has two million people and is in former East Germany. Their Parliament is called a Landtag and they just went to the polls. The results so far are: So a huge swing from CDU to AFD. You need 42 seats to govern. The…
They’re anti-immigration, not Nazis
Did the Sewing Machine Reduce the Workload for Women?
10 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in discrimination, economic growth, economic history, economics of education, gender, history of economic thought, human capital, industrial organisation, labour economics, labour supply, macroeconomics, occupational choice, poverty and inequality, technological progress Tags: creative destruction, The Great Enrichment
Is new technology that replaces a worker a good thing? We have a tendency, it seems to me, to believe that most previous inventions turned out to have overall net social benefits, but to be worried that all future inventions will instead have overall net social costs. Philipp Ager and Davide Coluccia tackle the question of…
Did the Sewing Machine Reduce the Workload for Women?
Saxony-Anhalt 2026
09 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, Public Choice Tags: Germany
In the German state of Saxony-Anhalt on 6 September, the Alternative for Germany (AfD) won a strong plurality of votes and seats in the state parliament. The outcome is not a surprise, given that polling in advance of the election had been picking up a surge for the AfD and a decline for the Christian […]
Saxony-Anhalt 2026
Lion vs. Giraffe: Who Will Win? | Lion Kingdom
09 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in economics of information, economics of media and culture
The Best of Sir Humphrey from Series 1 | Yes, Minister | BBC Comedy Greats
09 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in television, TV shows
Potential deregulations
08 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in economics of regulation, labour economics, labour supply, politics - New Zealand, politics - USA Tags: economics of immigration
Cato’s Handbook on Affordability provides a set of policy recommendations for reducing unnecessary government-imposed costs. There’s the usual stuff you’d expect, much of which is US-focused.But a few bits are worth thinking about here too.In the chapter on healthcare, Cato suggests automatic removal of prescription-only requirements from medicines. They write:Eliminate prescription regulation. The FDA makes medicines…
Potential deregulations
Populist political party folly
08 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in Economics of international refugee law, International law, labour economics, labour supply, law and economics, politics - Australia, politics - New Zealand Tags: British politics, France, Germany
I wonder whether the massive support for the (AFD) Alternatives for Germany party in the Saxony state election, along with the sight of hundreds of Brits trying to stop illegal migrants arriving by boat from France, while Pauline Hanson’s One Nation, out rates all the other parties, will finally get western elites to face the […]
Populist political party folly
Some Comments on the Significance of Labor Unions for Economic Policy – Items – Collected Works of Milton Friedman
08 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economic history, history of economic thought, industrial organisation, labour supply, Milton Friedman, survivor principle, unions
“To Write Well is to Think Clearly”: David McCullough
08 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in economic history, economics of education, politics - USA
The great historian David McCullough (1933-2022) won the Pulitzer prize for biography twice, for his books on Truman and John Adams, but he also wrote best-selling books on the Panama Canal, the Johnstown Flood, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Wright brothers, and others. Here are his comments in a 2002 interview with Bruce Cole on the…
“To Write Well is to Think Clearly”: David McCullough
IN THE ARENA: THEODORE ROOSEVELT IN WAR, PEACE AND REVOLUTION by David S. Brown
07 Sep 2026 Leave a comment
in defence economics, economic history, politics - USA
(Theodore Roosevelt at his Sagamore Hill home). There are numerous memorable biographies of Theodore Roosevelt. The best include the three volume work of Edmund Morris, Henry Pringle’s Pulitzer prize winning effort, David McCullogh’s National Book Award MORNING ON HORSEBACK, and Kathleen Dalton, H.W. Brands, and Nathan Miller’s critical works, among others. There are also a […]
IN THE ARENA: THEODORE ROOSEVELT IN WAR, PEACE AND REVOLUTION by David S. Brown
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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