Seven years ago, I pointed out a problem with the “market failure” justification for state action against markets. This objection has become more, not less, important with the passage of…
Category:
Economy
Stanford University’s information technology community produced, and then hid, a document entitled “Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative.” Stanford didn’t adopt the EOHLI document. The fact that Stanford has not directly…
An interest rate is a price: the price of rented capital. Alternatively, interest is the price of time. It’s the cost borrowers pay to transfer purchasing power from their future…
If news of inflation and recession has you feeling a bit Grinchy, some historical perspective might put some joy back into the season. Our current economic woes are significant, and…
If you haven’t been following the “Twitter Files” saga, the gist of it is that the US federal government routinely pressured pre-Musk Twitter, and likely other social media giants including…
New orders for durable goods fell 2.1 percent in November, following a 0.7 percent gain in October. Total durable-goods orders are up 10.6 percent from a year ago. The November…
Sales of new single-family homes rose again in November, increasing 5.8 percent to 640,000 at a seasonally-adjusted annual rate from a 605,000 pace in October. The November gain was the…
The final December results from the University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers show overall consumer sentiment improved for the month but remains near historically low levels (see first chart). The…
On April 23, 1985, the Coca-Cola Company made one of the biggest mistakes in American business history: it changed the formula for Coca-Cola. Outraged consumers sent hate mail to Coca-Cola…
For years the North Korean playbook was obvious to the world. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea wanted to be the center of attention. If the rest of the world…