In an era where many people are highly sensitive to what personal information is being collected about them, and how that information is being used, one sometimes hear the question: Why should the government have any power to know your income? In a US context, the question is often asked around April 15, when income…
Tax Privacy
Tax Privacy
16 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of bureaucracy, Public Choice, public economics Tags: tax privacy
Against cultural equivalence
15 Apr 2025 1 Comment
in economic history, history of economic thought, law and economics, liberalism, libertarianism, Marxist economics, property rights Tags: Age of Enlightenment, The Great Enrichment
The assertion that all cultures are equal has become a widely accepted axiom in contemporary discourse, shaped significantly by well-intentioned efforts to foster global tolerance and respect. However, it is not only possible but necessary to challenge this view. While cultural relativism emphasizes understanding and tolerance, it need not extend to cultural equivalence. Indeed, an […]
Against cultural equivalence
Greens now campaigning against prisons as well as police
15 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of crime, law and economics, Marxist economics, politics - New Zealand Tags: crime and punishment, criminal deterrence, law and order
Stuff reports: Green MP Tamatha Paul has launched a fundraising campaign for a group wanting to “defund the police” and close the court system. Paul has been attracting attention over recent weeks for her comments about policing and support of groups that call for the abolition of police, jails, and courts. While she and the Green Party […]
Greens now campaigning against prisons as well as police
Bill Maher visits the White House and has dinner with Trump
14 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in politics - USA, television, TV shows Tags: 2024 presidential election
Not long ago Bill Maher went to the White House to schmooze and dine with, yes, Donald Trump. Trump signed a list of bad names that he called Maher over the years, showed him the small room off the Oval Office which Clinton and Monica Lewinsky made famous, and even gave Maher a MAGA hat. […]
Bill Maher visits the White House and has dinner with Trump
Some Links
14 Apr 2025 1 Comment
in applied price theory, history of economic thought, industrial organisation, international economics, politics - USA Tags: 2024 presidential election, free trade, tarrifs
TweetBob Graboyes masterfully exposes many of the fallacies that fuel Trump’s destructive trade ‘policy.’ Three slices: In 2016, Donald Trump promised, “We’re gonna win so much that you may get tired of winning.” His advisors must have reached that point, as evidenced by the bizarre, incoherent “Liberation Day” tariff policy they helped craft. Trump supporters have…
Some Links
Your Latte and Lesson is Ready: Starbucks Employees Pause Service to Protest Immigration Policies
14 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in law and economics, politics - New Zealand Tags: 2024 presidential election, economics of immigration
We previously discussed how companies were barring political protests or paraphernalia at the workplace and how such rules are entirely enforceable. That made a recent story interesting when Starbucks workers across the country stopped working for a silent protest over the deportation of unlawful immigrants. Starbucks does not appear to be moving to stop such […]
Your Latte and Lesson is Ready: Starbucks Employees Pause Service to Protest Immigration Policies
Nobuo Fujita-the only Japanese pilot to bomb mainland America, 1942
14 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in defence economics, war and peace Tags: Japan, World War II
Nobuo Fujita was a Japanese naval officer and aviator who holds a unique place in World War II history—as the only person to conduct an aerial bombing of the continental United States. His story, however, goes far beyond this singular event, evolving into a remarkable tale of reconciliation, peace, and personal transformation. The War Years […]
Nobuo Fujita-the only Japanese pilot to bomb mainland America, 1942
WHOOP WHOOP — DEFUND DA POLICE
13 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of crime, law and economics, Marxist economics, politics - New Zealand Tags: crime and punishment, regressive left
The Sensible Sentencing Trust announced: ‘Whoop Whoop — Defund Da Police’: Sensible Sentencing Trust Drops Satirical Hip Hop Song Targeting Green Party’s Anti-Police AgendaThe Sensible Sentencing Trust has today released a satirical hip hop song and music video parodying the Green Party’s radical stance on law and order, including calls by its electorate MPs to defund the…
WHOOP WHOOP — DEFUND DA POLICE
Catholics in the Commons after emancipation
13 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in discrimination, economic history, economics of religion Tags: British constitutional law, British politics
Today (13 April) marks the anniversary of the Roman Catholic Relief Act gaining royal assent in 1829, which removed many of the barriers restricting Roman Catholics from sitting in Parliament. However, as Dr Philip Salmon of the Victorian Commons explores, hostility to Catholics continued despite their emancipation … It may seem surprising to some that […]
Catholics in the Commons after emancipation
There’s little evidence that subsidies and protections have substantially raised the number of children women have over their lifetime
13 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of love and marriage, labour economics, labour supply, law and economics, population economics Tags: economics of fertility
See They Want More Babies: Now They Have Friends in the White House by Lydia DePillis of The NY Times. Excerpts: “In designing policy requests for federal legislators, however, pronatalists run into a problem: There’s little evidence that subsidies and protections have substantially raised the number of children women have over their lifetime. It’s not for…
There’s little evidence that subsidies and protections have substantially raised the number of children women have over their lifetime
Strange alliances on alcohol vote
13 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of regulation, health economics, politics - New Zealand Tags: economics of prohibition
The House voted on the first reading of the bill by Kieran McAnulty’s bill to allow businesses that are allowed to open on public holidays to have normal alcohol sale conditions apply. It is a very common sense bill and passed 67 to 54. It is a personal vote, but it was interesting where the […]
Strange alliances on alcohol vote
Winston Peters at 80: the populist’s populist clocks up 50 years of political comebacks
13 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
Grant Duncan writes – Winston Peters turned a venerable 80 on April 11, but he showed no sign of retiring as New Zealand’s archetypal populist during his recent state of the nation speech. He especially enjoyed the hecklers, gleefully telling them one by one to get out. As ever, his detractors became extras in the […]
Winston Peters at 80: the populist’s populist clocks up 50 years of political comebacks
Some Links
13 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, industrial organisation, international economics Tags: 2024 presidential election, free trade, tarrifs
TweetTunku Varadarajan’s “Weekend Interview” in the Wall Street Journal is with the great Dartmouth trade economist and economic historian Doug Irwin. Three slices: In effect, Mr. Trump also slapped tariffs on 10005, Wall Street’s ZIP Code, for America’s markets cowered in horror. Dollar assets experienced such a rout that Mr. Trump himself took notice of…
Some Links
NZ workplace safety experiment a breath of fresh air
12 Apr 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of regulation, health and safety, labour economics, law and economics, politics - New Zealand, property rights
Oliver Hartwich writes – One of the pleasures of my job as Executive Director of The New Zealand Initiative is hosting events with Ministers explaining their new policies to our members. Last week, we hosted Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden at our annual retreat. I was impressed by the range of policies […]
NZ workplace safety experiment a breath of fresh air
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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