Donald J. Boudreaux
The Greatest Service Economists Perform
When done well, economics regularly reveals that that which appears to the popular mind to be undeniably true is often a mirage, or at least highly questionable. No service performed by economists is as important as this one.
Three Burning Questions about Political Economy
Can you explain why we Americans today, who are so much richer than were our great-great grandparents, are also so much more fearful than they were of peaceful immigrants?
The Jets, the Sharks, and a Trade Agreement
The following tale about trade, protectionism, and trade agreements is more realistic than it seems on the surface.
How to Destroy the Value of Work and Property
Overstating how misinformed, unrealistic, and just plain wacky are the economics that underlie these proposals of Sens. Warren and Sanders is impossible. Also impossible to overstate is the amount of damage that enactment of these proposals would inflict on the American economy.
The Great Danger of the Stakeholder Mandate
While there are imperfections in today’s economy in general and its system of corporate governance in particular, these are nowhere as extensive and threatening as Sen. Warren thinks them to be. And these imperfections are certainly not so serious as to justify any militant and wholesale restructuring of corporate law of the sort that Sen.…
What Is Mercantilism?
I do not deny that countless other modern-day politicians are also mercantilists. But this fact doesn’t mean that Trump is less of a mercantilist than he really is. He is a poster-boy for modern-day mercantilism.
The Empirical Reality of the Minimum Wage
But even after excluding all shoddily done studies of minimum wages, we’re still left with conflict in the conclusions. Fortunately, economic theory itself supplies clues as to why.
President Trump’s Bargaining Prowess Is a Liability, Not an Asset
When aggression is military, each government attempts to protect its citizens from that which is unleashed by foreigners. But when aggression is economic, it is unleashed by each government against its own citizens.
Trade Retaliation Hurts Everyone
Whenever our government “retaliates” with trade restrictions of its own, it unfairly tilts the playing field here at home in favor of politically potent producer groups and against the rest of us.
National Defense Is Not an Exception to the Case for Free Trade
The very best system of national defense is one that reduces the prospect of war. It is one that diminishes the need to actually send into battle war machines and manpower. So anyone sincerely committed to a program of using trade policy as a means of strengthening national defense supports as an indispensable cornerstone of that…
