The image is captioned “1940s Pediatric Iron Lung”.
Never forget
22 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in economic history, health economics Tags: anti-vaccination movement, vaccines
Behind on vaccines blogging
21 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in economic history, health economics Tags: anti-vaccination movement, regressive left, The Great Escape, vaccines
Consortium of secular organizations attack scientists deemed transphobic, The Center for Inquiry responds
21 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of education, economics of religion, health economics, politics - USA Tags: 2024 presidential election, Age of Enlightenment, conjecture and refutation, free speech, philosophy of science, political correctness, regressive left, sex discrimination
This will be the next-to-last item I write about my entanglement with the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF)—I hope. I am pretty sure that the joint statement below resulted from the fracas that ensued after the FFRF took down my post about biological sex, followed by my resignation and those of Richard Dawkins and Steve […]
Consortium of secular organizations attack scientists deemed transphobic, The Center for Inquiry responds
In which I go on Piers Morgan Uncensored (sex and gender issues, of course), followed by a debate
21 Jan 2025 1 Comment
in discrimination, gender, health economics, liberalism, Marxist economics, politics - USA Tags: free speech, gender gap, political correctness, regressive left, sex discrimination
When I was invited to go on Piers Morgan Uncensored, I was deeply undecided. I knew Morgan was quite conservative and religious, and I’ve seen clips of him bullying his guests. So I had a back-and-forth with the producer, trying to discern what Morgan wanted to ask me about. I got a long list of […]
In which I go on Piers Morgan Uncensored (sex and gender issues, of course), followed by a debate
DON BRASH: Equality is not a dirty word
21 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in discrimination, health economics, income redistribution, law and economics, liberalism, Marxist economics, politics - New Zealand, property rights, Public Choice, rentseeking Tags: constitutional law, racial discrimination
Surely, in a liberal democracy, there are few words more chilling to read written in earnest than the “flawed concept of ‘equality’”. But there they were, in print, in an opinion piece by the National Urban Māori Authority’s Lady Tureiti Moxon published in the NZ Herald on Tuesday last week. The Treaty Principles Bill has…
DON BRASH: Equality is not a dirty word
#vaccines work
17 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in economic history, environmental economics, health economics Tags: anti-vaccination movement, child mortality, infant mortality, life expectancies, The Great Escape, vaccines
The Dutch Hunger Winter: The 1944/45 Famine
16 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in defence economics, health economics, war and peace Tags: Netherlands, World War II
The Dutch Hunger Winter, also known as the Hongerwinter, was a devastating famine that gripped the Netherlands during the final months of World War II, from November 1944 to April 1945. This period of extreme hardship left a profound mark on Dutch society, shaped the collective memory of the war, and offered critical insights into […]
The Dutch Hunger Winter: The 1944/45 Famine
Horse Manure, Climate Change, and Nuclear Energy
14 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in economic history, economics of climate change, energy economics, environmental economics, environmentalism, global warming, health economics, politics - USA, transport economics, urban economics Tags: climate alarmism
The “Great Manure Crisis” of the late 19th century offers some serious lessons for those worried about the “existential threat” of global warming from CO2 emissions.
Horse Manure, Climate Change, and Nuclear Energy
Evolving Returns to Personality
12 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, econometerics, health economics, human capital, labour supply, occupational choice
Weanalyze trends in labor-market returns to psychological traits using data from half a million Finnish men from 2001 to 2015. Cognitive skills’ value declined, while noncognitive skills’ value increased. Our novel findings show that extraversion drives this rise, while conscientiousness remains stable. Extraversion’s rising returns are most pronounced for lower earners and those on the […]
Evolving Returns to Personality
The Health Research Council
11 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in health economics, politics - New Zealand Tags: cranks, political correctness, regressive left
In late August 2024, the Minister of Health, Dr Shane Reti, issued updated guidance to the Health Research Council (“HRC”) after years of scandalous funding was revealed. Dr Reti wanted it to fund cures, not Kaupapa, and definitely not spiritual curses. Especially given $126 million is spent in annual “health” research and the government’s books are not […]
The Health Research Council
Another big tobacco black market bust
05 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economics of regulation, health economics, politics - New Zealand Tags: black markets, economics of smoking
NewstalkZB reports: Police have restrained more than $2.5 million in assets, including four properties in Gisborne, after a discovery of undeclared tobacco was intercepted at the border. It comes after Customs intercepted 110kg of loose tobacco and more than 230,000 cigarettes – approximately 10,000 packets – concealed in Chinese tea packets in November last year, bound for residential and […]
Another big tobacco black market bust
Polio
05 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in economic history, health economics Tags: anti-vaccination movement, The Great Escape, vaccines
Modern Scientific Controversies: The War on Food: Part 1
04 Jan 2025 1 Comment
in economics of regulation, health economics Tags: Anti-Science left, food safety
The nutrition and food news today, including radio, TV, blogs, is full of stories decrying the consumption of Ultra-Processed Foods – UPFs. Normally I would give a series of links to the latest headlines but I doubt anyone could have missed them – they have been ubiquitous.
Modern Scientific Controversies: The War on Food: Part 1
Atheist Orthodoxy: The Freedom From Religion Foundation Censors Scientist Over Transgender Views
03 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in discrimination, economics of education, gender, health economics, law and economics, liberalism, Marxist economics, politics - USA, property rights Tags: Age of Enlightenment, conjecture and refutation, free speech, Freedom of religion, gender gap, philosophy of science, political correctness, regressive left, sex discrimination
The Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) is under fire this week after it censored a leading scientist, atheist, and board member, Jerry Coyne, a professor emeritus of ecology at the University of Chicago. The FFRF took down a column in which Coyne published a column titled “Biology is not bigotry,” a critique of an earlier […]
Atheist Orthodoxy: The Freedom From Religion Foundation Censors Scientist Over Transgender Views
The New FDA and the Regulation of Laboratory Developed Tests
28 Dec 2024 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economics of bureaucracy, economics of regulation, health economics, politics - USA, Public Choice Tags: drug lags
The FDA under President Trump and new FDA head Martin Makary should rapidly reverse the FDA’s powergrab on laboratory developed tests. To recap, laboratory developed tests (LDTs) are the kind your doctor orders, they are a service not a product and are not sold directly to patients. Congress has never given the FDA the authority […]
The New FDA and the Regulation of Laboratory Developed Tests
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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