Crisis
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Now It’s Obvious: The Political Class and the Media Are Spinning Tales
Rather than accepting the epistemic limitations of the current crisis as a reason to abstain from aggressive policies, they double down on the same. And when their chosen courses go awry or fail to deliver on their promised salvation, history is rewritten to obscure the fact that such promises were ever made.
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Will there Be Tyranny in the Post-Coronavirus World?
Fully entering into such a world, we really would be in George Orwell’s “newspeak:” coercion is liberty; command and control is freedom; political paternalism is self-realization; government planning is free association; collective decision-making is personal choice.
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Spanish Flu Was Awful But We Moved On Anyway
The Spanish Flu killed at least 50 million individuals in the span of a few months and contributed to a industrial production and commercial activity drop of between 16% to 25% in less than a year. Here are three prudent lessons on how to minimize long-term costs brought by temporary behavioral changes enacted to slow…
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Why Aren’t Americans Suing Their Way Out of Lockdown?
Whatever the causes of this uncharacteristic bit of non-litigiousness, Americans should know that ample legal precedents suggest that most shelter in place orders are unlawful and unconstitutional.
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Liberation From Lockdown Now
The only way to stimulate the economy is to liberate it. The people, all of us, need emancipation from the lockdown. And we need it now.
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The Monumental Failure of the CDC
This time, these government failures have resulted in millions of Americans being all stuck in their homes, schools being closed, the economy in a recession, and 18,000 people having died so far.
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The Epistemology of COVID-19
How do we know what we know, when the coronavirus crisis has shown that even “hard” science does not easily discern Truth from Error? Data can be “massaged” by removing “outliers,” putting in “lags,” smoothing in different ways, and on and on. The distortions do not have to be deliberate to be a major problem.
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Why Is This Texas Hospital Furloughing Nurses?
Just as the political class decided what is an essential vs nonessential business, so too have it decided what are essential and nonessential medical treatments. As a result, people who could be undergoing needed treatment are sitting at home under house arrest, while nurses who normally have busy jobs are also at home.
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The Virtues of Fiscal Discipline
Deficits used to be temporary affairs racked up in exceptional periods as the result of shocks, and paid down with surpluses. Despite years of decent economic growth, public debts in most western countries remain at high levels relative to GDP. Consequently, capacity to respond to crisis – such as natural disasters, wars and the one…
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Capitalism Is Still Working, Thank Goodness
Economists rarely get to run field experiments for the whole economy. And thank goodness for that, because field experiments can be very damaging. But the coronavirus that every American has been dealing with for the last month has given us as close to a field experiment as we’re ever likely to get.
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•
Now It’s Obvious: The Political Class and the Media Are Spinning Tales
Rather than accepting the epistemic limitations of the current crisis as a reason to abstain from aggressive policies, they double down on the same. And when their chosen courses go awry or fail to deliver on their promised salvation, history is rewritten to obscure the fact that such promises were ever made.
-
•
Will there Be Tyranny in the Post-Coronavirus World?
Fully entering into such a world, we really would be in George Orwell’s “newspeak:” coercion is liberty; command and control is freedom; political paternalism is self-realization; government planning is free association; collective decision-making is personal choice.
-
•
Spanish Flu Was Awful But We Moved On Anyway
The Spanish Flu killed at least 50 million individuals in the span of a few months and contributed to a industrial production and commercial activity drop of between 16% to 25% in less than a year. Here are three prudent lessons on how to minimize long-term costs brought by temporary behavioral changes enacted to slow…
-
•
Why Aren’t Americans Suing Their Way Out of Lockdown?
Whatever the causes of this uncharacteristic bit of non-litigiousness, Americans should know that ample legal precedents suggest that most shelter in place orders are unlawful and unconstitutional.
-
•
Liberation From Lockdown Now
The only way to stimulate the economy is to liberate it. The people, all of us, need emancipation from the lockdown. And we need it now.
-
•
The Monumental Failure of the CDC
This time, these government failures have resulted in millions of Americans being all stuck in their homes, schools being closed, the economy in a recession, and 18,000 people having died so far.
-
•
The Epistemology of COVID-19
How do we know what we know, when the coronavirus crisis has shown that even “hard” science does not easily discern Truth from Error? Data can be “massaged” by removing “outliers,” putting in “lags,” smoothing in different ways, and on and on. The distortions do not have to be deliberate to be a major problem.
-
•
Why Is This Texas Hospital Furloughing Nurses?
Just as the political class decided what is an essential vs nonessential business, so too have it decided what are essential and nonessential medical treatments. As a result, people who could be undergoing needed treatment are sitting at home under house arrest, while nurses who normally have busy jobs are also at home.
-
•
The Virtues of Fiscal Discipline
Deficits used to be temporary affairs racked up in exceptional periods as the result of shocks, and paid down with surpluses. Despite years of decent economic growth, public debts in most western countries remain at high levels relative to GDP. Consequently, capacity to respond to crisis – such as natural disasters, wars and the one…
-
•
Capitalism Is Still Working, Thank Goodness
Economists rarely get to run field experiments for the whole economy. And thank goodness for that, because field experiments can be very damaging. But the coronavirus that every American has been dealing with for the last month has given us as close to a field experiment as we’re ever likely to get.