Ten Minute English and British History #19 – The Early Stuarts and the Gunpowder Plot
21 Sep 2018 Leave a comment
in constitutional political economy, economic history, economics of bureaucracy, economics of religion, law and economics, Public Choice, public economics, rentseeking Tags: English history
Dead Wrong® with Johan Norberg – Why Swedes Vote for Populists
20 Sep 2018 Leave a comment
in economic growth, economics of crime, Economics of international refugee law, income redistribution, international economic law, international economics, law and economics, population economics, poverty and inequality, Public Choice, public economics, rentseeking, unemployment Tags: populism, Sweden, voter demographics
Rejoinder to Press Council complaint on Inequality Tower 2018 @toby_etc @XTOTL @MaxRashbrooke @TheSpinoffTV
05 Sep 2018 Leave a comment
in politics - New Zealand, public economics
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Speaking of capital gains taxes
02 Sep 2018 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economic growth, macroeconomics, public economics, Robert E. Lucas Tags: capital gains tax, taxation and investment
Has real socialism ever been tried?
31 Aug 2018 Leave a comment
in comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, economics of bureaucracy, industrial organisation, law and economics, Marxist economics, Public Choice, public economics Tags: fall of communism, regressive left
Stossel: Bernie’s Digital Media Empire
22 Aug 2018 Leave a comment
in economics of information, economics of media and culture, entrepreneurship, health economics, labour economics, minimum wage, politics - USA, Public Choice, public economics Tags: regressive left
Jake Tapper fact-checks @SenSanders’ health care claims
18 Aug 2018 Leave a comment
in health economics, politics - USA, public economics Tags: health insurance
To the Press Council on Inequality Tower 2018 @toby_etc @XTOTL @MaxRashbrooke @TheSpinoffTV
17 Aug 2018 Leave a comment
in economics of information, politics - New Zealand, poverty and inequality, public economics
Two words. Two words would have changed the Inequality Tower from deeply misleading to accurate. Those two words also would have greatly undermined the political narrative in the cartoon of the political powerlessness of ordinary people over housing affordability.
The response of The Spinoff to my complaint was on one aspect and ignored all the others.
The editor ran the line that capital gains taxes is the same as saying comprehensive capital gains tax. You might have been able to run that line a few years ago but not now after the capital gains tax bright line test of 2 years and now 5 years. A five-year bright line is enough to deal with speculation and changes the debate from the lack of a capital gains tax at all to a capital gains tax on the family home or farm after the death of parents and other deeply unpopular political ramifications.
The other missing word was might. It was simply wrong to claim that people will not pay taxes on the sale of their home. They might under current law.
Ironically, editor’s reply was on the day the ban on foreign sales was passed into law showing once again responsiveness of parliament to popular concerns about housing affordability. The same responsiveness to the angst of ordinary voters led to the bright line test of 2 years and now 5 years.
At bottom, if you ask a careful and scrupulous scholar such as Max Rashbrooke to sign onto your comic cartoon, you raise the bar for yourself in terms of factual accuracy in an opinion piece. If he had not co-signed the cartoon, I most likely would never have read it.
This rejoinder is in addition to my attached original complaint to The Spinoff which I also submit to the Press Council.
@toby_etc reply to Press Council complaint: Inequality Tower 2018 @XTOTL @MaxRashbrooke @TheSpinoffTV
16 Aug 2018 1 Comment
in politics - New Zealand, poverty and inequality, Public Choice, public economics
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Gary Becker Intellectual Portrait part 6
15 Aug 2018 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, comparative institutional analysis, economics of crime, environmental economics, Gary Becker, law and economics, politics - USA, Public Choice, public economics, Richard Posner Tags: interest groups, law and order
“You’re all a bunch of socialists” Mises on Friedman
08 Aug 2018 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, applied welfare economics, Austrian economics, comparative institutional analysis, F.A. Hayek, income redistribution, Ludwig von Mises, Milton Friedman, Public Choice, public economics Tags: taxation and investment, taxation and labour supply
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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