Art Carden
Senior Fellow
Art Carden is a Senior Fellow at the American Institute for Economic Research. He is also an Associate Professor of Economics at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama and a Research Fellow at the Independent Institute.
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Create Wealth Without Making Anything
“Sellers at vintage markets and flea malls are creating value every bit as much as their friends and neighbors working in the coal mines or in the mills. They’re transforming lower-value assets to higher-value uses.” ~Art Carden
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Arguments Against The Death Penalty and Gun Control Have A Few Things in Common
“We can’t say, ‘There is no point, because the average criminal won’t obey the law.’ Just because the average criminal doesn’t obey the law, that does not mean the marginal criminal won’t.” ~Art Carden
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You Are Making a Difference. You Just Have To Know How to Look At It.
“Someone who designs a better salad bar or who lays out a better floor plan for a grocery store might not think he’s feeding the poor, clothing the naked, or fighting food insecurity. But he is.” ~Art Carden
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Let People Reimagine Housing to Make It More Affordable
“People might be willing to live without their own kitchens and bathrooms if it means a cheaper place to sleep. Regulation’s underlying philosophy is that I know better than you how you should live and what tradeoffs you should make.” ~Art Carden
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This Joke Isn’t Funny Anymore: Maybe You Don’t Need a Can Opener
“Pull tabs and plastic bottles are among the innumerable wonders free people exercising free minds in free markets bring to us every day in exchange for progressively fewer fruits of our labors.” ~Art Carden
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Leave The Fence Alone: On ‘Toward a Political Economy of the Commons: Simple Rules for Sustainability’
“Polycentric governance, secure property rights, and free markets reinforced by a culture valuing trust, patience, and individualism lead to successful management of common-pool resources like forests, fisheries, minerals, and climate.” ~Art Carden
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The Can Conundrum: Governments Don’t Have Coherent Goals
“Policies enacted to fix one problem lead to still other problems, which will then require other policies to fix, and so on, until we’re crushed by a giant snowball of well-intended “solutions” and their unintended consequences.” ~ Art Carden
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In Defense of Cash Grabs
“It doesn’t have to make sense to the outside observer, because ‘the system’ is not something a single mind designed but the unintended consequence of innumerable individual choices in response to (sometimes badly distorted) incentives.” ~ Art Carden
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The Three-Headed Monster Giving Us Lousy Public Policy
“The prosperity we enjoy is constantly under attack by a political monster that never stops putting obstacles along the road to riches.” ~ Art Carden
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Why is Lionel Messi Wasting His Time at Publix?
“Maybe Messi isn’t wasting his time shopping at Publix. After all, they’re writing some of the checks to cover his eight-figure annual salary, and maybe conspicuously shopping there is part of the bargain.” ~ Art Carden
-
•
Create Wealth Without Making Anything
“Sellers at vintage markets and flea malls are creating value every bit as much as their friends and neighbors working in the coal mines or in the mills. They’re transforming lower-value assets to higher-value uses.” ~Art Carden
-
•
Arguments Against The Death Penalty and Gun Control Have A Few Things in Common
“We can’t say, ‘There is no point, because the average criminal won’t obey the law.’ Just because the average criminal doesn’t obey the law, that does not mean the marginal criminal won’t.” ~Art Carden
-
•
You Are Making a Difference. You Just Have To Know How to Look At It.
“Someone who designs a better salad bar or who lays out a better floor plan for a grocery store might not think he’s feeding the poor, clothing the naked, or fighting food insecurity. But he is.” ~Art Carden
-
•
Let People Reimagine Housing to Make It More Affordable
“People might be willing to live without their own kitchens and bathrooms if it means a cheaper place to sleep. Regulation’s underlying philosophy is that I know better than you how you should live and what tradeoffs you should make.” ~Art Carden
-
•
This Joke Isn’t Funny Anymore: Maybe You Don’t Need a Can Opener
“Pull tabs and plastic bottles are among the innumerable wonders free people exercising free minds in free markets bring to us every day in exchange for progressively fewer fruits of our labors.” ~Art Carden
-
•
Leave The Fence Alone: On ‘Toward a Political Economy of the Commons: Simple Rules for Sustainability’
“Polycentric governance, secure property rights, and free markets reinforced by a culture valuing trust, patience, and individualism lead to successful management of common-pool resources like forests, fisheries, minerals, and climate.” ~Art Carden
-
•
The Can Conundrum: Governments Don’t Have Coherent Goals
“Policies enacted to fix one problem lead to still other problems, which will then require other policies to fix, and so on, until we’re crushed by a giant snowball of well-intended “solutions” and their unintended consequences.” ~ Art Carden
-
•
In Defense of Cash Grabs
“It doesn’t have to make sense to the outside observer, because ‘the system’ is not something a single mind designed but the unintended consequence of innumerable individual choices in response to (sometimes badly distorted) incentives.” ~ Art Carden
-
•
The Three-Headed Monster Giving Us Lousy Public Policy
“The prosperity we enjoy is constantly under attack by a political monster that never stops putting obstacles along the road to riches.” ~ Art Carden
-
•
Why is Lionel Messi Wasting His Time at Publix?
“Maybe Messi isn’t wasting his time shopping at Publix. After all, they’re writing some of the checks to cover his eight-figure annual salary, and maybe conspicuously shopping there is part of the bargain.” ~ Art Carden