Adam Thierer

Research Fellow

Adam Thierer was a writer at the American Institute for Economic Research. He is a Senior Research Fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University.

Ridiculous Liquor Regulations

"The good news is that evasive entrepreneurs and an increasingly technologically-empowered public will keep pushing back and hopefully whittle away at the continuing vestiges of Prohibition Era stupidity. Where there’s…

Ridiculous Liquor Regulations

Innovation and the Trouble with the Precautionary Principle

Policies that frown upon entrepreneurial risk-taking actively disincentivize the building of new and better things. We must remove political barriers to productive entrepreneurialism or else we will never get back…

Innovation and the Trouble with the Precautionary Principle

How the US Botched Coronavirus Testing

Highly restrictive procedures for virus testing have had the unintended consequence of shutting down tests that could detect outbreaks and save lives. Going by the book apparently mattered more than…

How the US Botched Coronavirus Testing

San Fran’s Plan to Smother Innovation With Permission Slips

The surest way to discourage innovators is to treat them and their inventions as guilty until proven innocent.

San Fran’s Plan to Smother Innovation With Permission Slips

The Worst Regulation Ever Proposed

It would let bureaucrats at the new Federal Automation and Worker Protection Agency sit in judgment of what constitutes beneficial forms of innovation and ask them to predict or plan…

The Worst Regulation Ever Proposed

Is There a Science of Progress?

Even if it proves to be an inexact science, the effort is worth undertaking.

Is There a Science of Progress?

How Regulation Wrecks Innovation

Many laws and regulations create direct or indirect barriers to the emergence of new ideas and organizations.

How Regulation Wrecks Innovation

Sen. Hawley’s Moral Panic Over Social Media

Forcing social media sites to “disappear” or be broken up is one of the worst ways to deal with these concerns.

Sen. Hawley’s Moral Panic Over Social Media

Spring Cleaning for the Regulatory State

Statutes and regulations continue to accumulate, layer by layer, until they suffocate not only economic opportunity, but also the effective administration of government itself.

Spring Cleaning for the Regulatory State

How To Defend a Culture of Innovation During the Technopanic

We need a vision and set of principles to fight back against neo-Luddites and their proposals to slow or stop technological change.

How To Defend a Culture of Innovation During the Technopanic