Scandinavian nations are not socialist, at least if we’re using the technical definition (government ownership, central planning, and price controls). But those countries do have big welfare states. And that means stifling tax burdens. And those harsh taxes don’t just apply to rich taxpayers. Lower-income and middle-class people also get pillaged. I’ve already explained that punitive value-added […]
TweetOpponents of the liberal market order often play fast and loose with the facts in order to discredit two of history’s greatest champions of the liberal market order, Milton Friedman and F.A. Hayek. Editor, The New York Review of Books Editor: Trevor Jackson writes of “the enthusiasm that free-market fundamentalists like Friedrich Hayek and Milton…
I wasn’t envisaging writing anything more for a while, but….Welllington’s weather certainly isn’t conducive to either the beach or the garden, and the Herald managed to get an interview with Iain Rennie, the new Secretary to the Treasury (not usually the sort of stuff for 27 December either). I’ve always been rather uneasy about heads […]
We live in a society utterly confused about parenthood and the role of fathers. The last Labour government made fathers increasingly irrelevant. In 2020 a law change repealing section 70a of the Social Security Act meant mothers applying for a sole parent benefit no longer had to name the father of their child for the…
Proposition 36, which increases punishments for some retail theft and drug possession offenses, overwhelmingly passed in California despite the opposition of Gov. Gavin Newsom and most Democrats. Newsom denounced the measure as something that “takes us back to the 1980s, mass incarceration.” Despite discussing her tough-on-crime record in the election, Vice President Kamala Harris refused […]
Deming, Ong and Summers have a good overview of long-run and very recent changes in the US labor market. Using a measure of occupational titles the authors find: The years spanning 1990-2017 were the most stable period in the history of the US labor market, going back nearly 150 years. It’s a bit too early […]
The Governor General does not decide when the House of Commons or the Senate come out of an adjournment and resume sitting. The House of Commons and Senate vote to adjourn themselves and to resume sitting, but the Crown summons, prorogues, and dissolves Parliament on the Prime Minister’s advice. This really is not complicated. Yet […]
By Paul Homewood The Government has begun consultations on the role of hybrid cars between 2030 and 2035: . The UK automotive and charging industries have been invited to shape the UK’s transition to zero emission vehicles, as the UK government works with the sector to harness the huge opportunities for economic growth and […]
The decision of President Joe Biden to clear the federal death row has caused an uproar in some quarters and praise in others. There are good-faith arguments on both sides. However, there was a curious element to the Biden pardons for 37 people on death row. There were 40 people on death row. Three remain.
Washington State’s unofficial state motto has long been “Al-ki” which means either “bye and bye” or “by and by” in Chinook. The former meaning now seems official as Gov. Jay Inslee pushed for a “wealth tax.” Wealthy citizens are already saying bye to the state in anticipation of what one Democratic billionaire recently called a […]
The Reichstag Fire Trial, held in Leipzig from September 21 to December 23, 1933, was one of the most notorious and politically charged trials of the 20th century. The trial followed the fire that engulfed the Reichstag building in Berlin on February 27, 1933. This event and its subsequent judicial proceedings not only reflected the […]
Graeme Weber reports from Australia on the history revealing multiple holes in IPCC claimed “settled science.” His paper is IPCC – Miss/Diss information? shared with me by email. Graeme is an earth scientist, retired consulting geologist and advocate for nuclear energy. His text is in italics with my bolds and added images. Several years ago, […]
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
“We do not believe any group of men adequate enough or wise enough to operate without scrutiny or without criticism. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it, that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. We know that in secrecy error undetected will flourish and subvert”. - J Robert Oppenheimer.
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