ARNOLD KLING
August 14, 2011
The Top Political Contributors
August 11, 2011
Gender and the New Commanding Heights
August 11, 2011
Jamie Galbraith Makes an Assumption
August 11, 2011
Macroeconometrics: The Science of Hubris
August 10, 2011
Real and Nominal Bond Yields
BRYAN CAPLAN
August 14, 2011
The Effect of Thumb Sucking on Income
August 12, 2011
The Voice of Cold, Hard Truth to All Would-Be Educators
August 12, 2011
Ability, Morality, and Prosperity: A Paper and a Report
August 11, 2011
The Theory of Time and Frittering
August 10, 2011
Male Variance and the Remnants of the Gender Gap
DAVID HENDERSON
August 9, 2011
Hayek in "Unbroken", Part Two
August 8, 2011
Hayek in "Unbroken"
August 5, 2011
James Bovard on the Peace Corps
August 4, 2011
Summers Way Off on FDR and 1941
August 3, 2011
The "Amazon" Tax
SHARE
I think you're right; libertarians can't win. We've come a long way, but have a much longer way to go in educating the public about economics so that we have a chance of winning.
Libertarianism, small "l", is an economic theory that states there is an optimum, generally smaller, relative size of government that mazimizes productivity.
This change in the Republican Party coincided with the fall of the Soviets and the expansion of global free trade.
China dollarized, the U.S. provides global trade security, and foreign populations pay taxes via a depreciating dollar. So, libertarian measurement of the relative size of goverment is much harder, and Republicans virtually represent billions of non-voting global citizens.
It is the internationalization of US politics that is causing uncertainty among economists.
the strength of libertarianism is the emphasis on the individual.
however, individualism turns out to be a weakness, when group decisions and actions are required, as is the case with international cases.
sometimes smokers and non-smokers must band together competitively to save clean air and tobacco. i have not heard libertarianism speak strongly and relevantly to cooperation and successful team competition.
The prostitutes still need an answer when they get asked how to fix certain problems. The libertarians need to win the intellectual debate so they can be the people supplying those answers. Then they need to educate the public so that the prostitutes are not afraid to give libertarian answers
Wow, Matt. Very interesting, avant-garde analysis... In what sense did China dollarize? (Not a sarcastic put-down question; I think you might be onto something but possibly you're just crazy, I'd like to know...)
"Democrats, when they win, tend to listen to their economists. Republicans seem to ignore theirs."
Depressing, isn't it? For all the complaints Republicans made of Clinton, at least he grew the size of the state more slowly than Bush.
"Democrats, when they win, tend to listen to their economists. Republicans seem to ignore theirs."
Depressing, isn't it?
Republicans not listening is bad, Dems listening to their economists is worse.