Donald J. Boudreaux
In Praise of an Ideology of Freedom
Because free markets typically give to producers as well as to consumers strong incentives to use their unique bits of knowledge in ways that promote the general welfare, that both the knowledge problem and the incentive problem exist at all levels of government decision-making means that what is warranted is a strong and general presumption against…
Capitalism Is Cleaning the World Every Single Day
The simple innovation of designing and installing doorless entry-exit ways for public restrooms is one small but real way in which innovative capitalism has made our exposure to pollution less than it was just a few decades ago.
On Family Leave, Leave the Market Be
Social engineering done by those on the political right is nearly always as destructive as is social engineering done by those on the political left.
The Market Provides the Optimal Amount of Family Leave
Why do some conservatives believe that family leave plan is necessary in the first place?
The Economics of Paid Leave
The fact that the market does not supply as much paid leave as people would want if they did not have to pay full price for it is not a market failure; it’s a market success.
The Myth of Budget-Neutral Spending
Advocates of new government programs often promise that their programs are budget neutral — meaning that adoption of these programs will not increase net government spending. It’s never true.
The State Is Not a Transcendental Being
Much of what the state does truly is predatory.
If We Put a Man on the Moon, We Can Surely…
We can admire the engineering prowess that enabled NASA to land men on the moon and return them safely to earth. But even if politicians (contrary to fact) were apolitical stewards of the public welfare, governing society is not an engineering task. It follows that NASA’s remarkable achievement emphatically does not imply that we should…
Books On Liberty that You Haven’t Read but Should
This great variety of influential books testifies to the richness of the libertarian scholarly tradition. It’s filled with remarkable works of scholarship that are not (yet) as widely known and read as they deserve to be.
The Fallacy of Us, We, and Our
Talk of “our” balance of trade is talk of something that doesn’t really exist; it’s merely a figment of the imagination made to appear real by an accounting convention that has the name “trade balance.” Nevertheless, this fictitious creature is daily demagogued by those seeking to clear the way for protectionist interventions.
