Noah’s Ark and the Sanctity of Private Property
The subject of a proposed religious theme park in Kentucky brings up an issue near and dear to the heart …
Category: Economics
Posts on economics
Posts on economics
The War on Poverty Revisited
By Edmund Opitz, originally published in the February 1986 edition of The Freeman. —- Capitalism, by conquering poverty, creates the …
To Save the World
By Edmund Opitz, originally published in the April 1984 edition of The Freeman. Status quo is a Latin phrase meaning, …
Ed Opitz shows us the Way of Freedom
A quote from Edmund Opitz. —- “The human spirit seeks full and free expression in every department of life: in …
Classic Essay: Against School
By John Taylor Gatto, originally published in Harpers, September 2003. How public education cripples our kids, and why I taught …
Teensploitation
Far from being environments conducive to learning, schools across the world coerce students to conform to the whims of politicians and bureaucrats. Billed as bastions of free expression, intellectual honesty and rigor, administrators have turned schools into prisons for the mind, where one-size- fits-all policies are forced upon youth and where independent thoughts are discarded. It’s a world in which the government will tell a student what they can and can’t think, wear, say, or do. It’s a world that crushes the individual for the benefit of those in power — a practice we’ve dubbed “Teensploitation.”
Progressives Against Progress
“Progress” is an abused word these days, especially by bureaucrats and the special interest groups that cater to them. Yet such groups, in the name of progress and social justice, support government intervention through intervention in the market, minimum or living wages, and universal healthcare. We find neither progress nor justice in government actions that advance one group at the expense of another.
ImmiGreat
Thanks in large part to misinformation, protectionist legislation passed with the support of Big Labor and other rent-seeking groups, and rhetoric accompanying these actions, immigration has become a divisive topic. As was seen between East and West Berlin decades ago and between the United States and Mexico today, this controversy sometimes results in the construction of physical barriers to prevent the free movement of individuals. Yet, fortunately there are some reasonable voices in this discussion, helping to point out how immigration restrictions further entrench governments and negate individual rights, in addition to severely hampering the economy.
Hands Off My Home
Thanks in large part to the work of the Institute for Justice and the 2005 Supreme Court case Kelo v. New London, eminent domain (the taking of private property by the government) has caused much grassroots and legal activity.
How Much Bureaucracy Did Congress Just Buy Us?
You have to hand it to the Federal Government, they really know how to take a bad situation and make …
What’s the difference between a gas station and a hospital?
We hear a lot of Republican and Democrat talking points about healthcare. As Libertarians, it’s important that people understand that …
Austrian Scholars Conference 2010 – Day 3
It has taken me a few days to finish this post. Unfortunately, I spent Sunday driving back home and Monday …
Austrian Scholars Conference 2010 – Day 2
The second day of the Austrian Scholars Conference 2010 was quite exciting. From lunch at the Mellow Mushroom munching on …
Freedom: My Anti-Gov
Freedom subsumes individual liberty and personal responsibility. If individuals are free to act and also held responsible to bear the consequences for their actions, good outcomes will be reinforce correct behavior and bad outcomes will provide a learning experience. When government gets in the way of this feedback loop, it prevents the development of virtue and merely subjects the individual to the will of the State.
Austrian Scholars Conference 2010 – Day 1
The first day of the Austrian Scholars Conference 2010 was marked by greeting old friends, making new friends, and meeting …
Free Trade Now!
Free trade exists when governments do not interfere with commercial transactions between individuals domestically and internationally. Free trade makes America and the world better off.
Enjoy Capitalism!
Capitalism is the only moral social system. Only a capitalist system allows you to act in your own interest, to keep what you have worked for and trade it with other willing individuals. For much of human history, wealth has been produced primarily by looting or enslaving others. Under capitalism wealth is created by serving others, by creating values for them.
Earth Liberation
Government policies cannot mimic the dynamism and spontaneity present in the market, and, in fact, more often than not create perverse and unintended consequences. The solution to environmental concerns is not for more government intervention but for the application of a free market approach, which encapsulates entrepreneurship, property rights, and voluntary transactions.
Why being a candidate can be beneficial for liberty
Though I think it is misguided to believe that electoral politics is the primary means of effecting change for the …
The Dismal Year
One year ago today, Barack Obama stepped into the Oval Office for his first full day as President. So far, …
Top 10 Disasters of the Obama Administration in 2009
Executive Director of the Libertarian Party Wes Benedict put together a retrospective of the executive administration this past year. Any …
Economics Has the Answer: What’s the Question?
By Edmund Opitz. Adam Smith’s monumental achievement was to enlarge the individual person’s freedom of action in economic affairs, and …
Ethics and Business
Business and the businessman have had a bad press, almost uniformly. Do you remember the television show whose hero was a businessman? The show that portrayed this businessman as a person of integrity and vision, who labored long hours to produce a product that supplied a genuine need, which he marketed at prices people could afford? Who treated his employees with generosity and consideration, and his customers with unfailing courtesy? Who was a devoted family man, active in civic affairs, and a churchman?
Freedom and Majority Rule
By Edmund Opitz Lord Northcliffe, the publisher of the London Times, came to this country a few years after World …
Isaiah’s Job
by Albert Jay Nock —- One evening last autumn, I sat long hours with a European acquaintance while he expounded …
Black Magic
By Edmund Opitz Every individual tries to economize his energies by satisfying his needs and desires with a minimum of …
Perspectives on Religion and Capitalism
By Edmund Opitz The two major terms in my title are subject to extravagant misunderstanding and occasional abuse. Some of …
The Nobility of the Bourgeoisie
By Edmund Opitz If the man from Mars were to ask any one of us to point out the business …
Intellectual Property and Libertarianism
Stephan Kinsella’s presentation at Mises University this past July is an excellent introduction to intellectual property, and to rights theory …
Universal Health Care is the new Post Office
Cash for Clunkers made no sense whatsoever. The Climate-Change Bill was just moronic. Universal Health Care, though, is going to …