Lab-grown diamonds are gaining share, but they might be getting too cheap and largeBy Jinjoo Lee of The WSJ. Excerpts:”After a postpandemic surge in demand in 2021 and 2022, natural-diamond prices are down about 8% compared with the first quarter of 2020, while lab-grown diamond prices are down 75%” [if they are substitutes for each…
Natural Diamonds Had a Rough Year—Some Hope to Restore Their Shine
Natural Diamonds Had a Rough Year—Some Hope to Restore Their Shine
18 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, entrepreneurship, industrial organisation, market efficiency, survivor principle Tags: creative destruction
Biden Uses Last-Minute AI Executive Order To Force More Green Energy Onto The Grid
18 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of regulation, energy economics, environmental economics, global warming, politics - USA, resource economics Tags: solar power, wind power
The executive order is another eleventh-hour move in what appears to be an effort to stymy President-elect Donald Trump’s energy agenda, which is expected to include a vast expansion of oil and gas drilling on federal lands and waters. Biden announced a ban Monday for future offshore oil and gas activity across 625 million acres of the outer continental shelf, citing a law that could prevent a successive administration from easily reversing the policy.
Biden Uses Last-Minute AI Executive Order To Force More Green Energy Onto The Grid
Further proof the Council just made things worse
17 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, comparative institutional analysis, economics of bureaucracy, economics of regulation, entrepreneurship, industrial organisation, politics - New Zealand, Public Choice, public economics, rentseeking, survivor principle
Stuff reports: Reading Cinemas is set to return to Wellington after it was revealed on Tuesday night that the cinema chain’s owner, Reading International, intends to undertake a redevelopment of the old building. The company has entered into a Sale and Purchase Agreement with Prime Property Group, with part of the deal including a seismic upgrade […]
Further proof the Council just made things worse
#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
Get To Many Moons, Not Just One
17 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of media and culture Tags: space
Over at Behind The Black, the blog of space enthusiast Robert Zimmerman, he has some suggestions for the US space industry and in particular NASA’s Artemis program to land humans on the Moon. The advice is directed at Trump’s nomination for the head of NASA, Jacob Isaacman, a billionaire who has already flown in space […]
Get To Many Moons, Not Just One
CA gov prevents voluntary wealth-creating transactions
17 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, comparative institutional analysis, economics of natural disasters, economics of regulation, law and economics, politics - USA, property rights
From REASON: On January 7, Newsom issued a state of emergency as fires spread in Los Angeles County. On Tuesday, Newsom signed Executive Order N-7-25, prohibiting buyers for three months from “making any unsolicited offer to an owner of real property” in fire-affected areas “for an amount less than the fair market value of the…
CA gov prevents voluntary wealth-creating transactions
Margaret Thatcher, Michael Curley, and the 19th Theorem of Government
16 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, applied welfare economics, Austrian economics, comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, economic growth, economic history, economics of regulation, energy economics, environmental economics, financial economics, fiscal policy, human capital, income redistribution, international economics, labour economics, labour supply, law and economics, liberalism, libertarianism, macroeconomics, Marxist economics, politics - USA, poverty and inequality, property rights, Public Choice, public economics, regulation, rentseeking
In this 12-second video, Margaret Thatcher is talking about the Labour Party in the United Kingdom, but her warning has universal application. And when I say her warning has universal application, I’m not joking. Politicians generally can’t resist the temptation to buy votes. And I fear that this can and will happen at all levels […]
Margaret Thatcher, Michael Curley, and the 19th Theorem of Government
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
One early report on congestion pricing in NYC
16 Jan 2025 1 Comment
in applied price theory, applied welfare economics, comparative institutional analysis, market efficiency, politics - USA, public economics, transport economics, urban economics Tags: road pricing
That is my latest Bloomberg column, here is one bit: The core version of the plan stipulates a $9 toll for drivers entering Manhattan below and including 60th Street. Implementation is by E-Z Pass, and the tolls can vary in complex ways. But if you don’t cross the line, you don’t pay. So residents below 60th Street are exempt, […]
One early report on congestion pricing in NYC
Bad leaders solicit bad advice
16 Jan 2025 1 Comment
in applied price theory, econometerics, economic history, human capital, labour economics, labour supply, politics - New Zealand, poverty and inequality, unemployment, welfare reform Tags: child poverty, family poverty
When Jacinda Ardern became Prime Minister, she was determined to increase income for children in welfare-dependent families – her magic bullet for solving child poverty. The Welfare Expert Advisory Group, led by Cindy Kiro, was convened to make the desired recommendations. A number of evidence briefs were provided to the group, one concerned the “likely…
Bad leaders solicit bad advice
The Evacuation of Auschwitz and the Death March
16 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in defence economics, economics of crime, International law, law and economics, laws of war, war and peace Tags: Nazi Germany, The Holocaust, World War II
From January 1945, in the final months of the Third Reich, approximately 250,000 concentration camp inmates perished during death marches and in numerous acts of mass slaughter. These prisoners were mercilessly murdered by SS guards, army and police units, and, in many cases, by civilian mobs as they passed through towns and villages in Germany,Austria […]
The Evacuation of Auschwitz and the Death March
Sowell says
15 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
“Most people on the left are not opposed to freedom. They are just in favor of all sorts of things that are incompatible with freedom. Freedom ultimately means the right of other people to do things that you do not approve of.” — Thomas Sowell — Thomas Sowell Quotes (@ThomasSowell) December 28, 2024
Sowell says
Jacksonian Obstruction: Smith Explains How He Was Planning to Circumvent the Decision in Fischer
15 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of crime, law and economics, politics - USA Tags: 2020 presidential election, 2024 presidential election
The release of the first part of Jack Smith’s report at midnight was the special counsel’s version of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision: we had seen it before. Putting aside the public filings where Smith fought to get this information out before the election, there was little new in the report. What the report did […]
Jacksonian Obstruction: Smith Explains How He Was Planning to Circumvent the Decision in Fischer
Assigning Responsibility for the Tragic Los Angeles Fires
15 Jan 2025 1 Comment
in economics of natural disasters, economics of regulation, environmental economics, environmentalism, law and economics, politics - USA, property rights, urban economics
Blaming climate change for these disasters only deflects attention away from actual causes. Fabrications linking rising CO2 to wildfires should be ignored. Governments must employ solutions that will truly protect people and their property from the unstoppable, natural conditions enabling devastating fires.
Assigning Responsibility for the Tragic Los Angeles Fires
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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