Robert E. Wright

Robert E. Wright is the (co)author or (co)editor of over two dozen major books, book series, and edited collections, including AIER’s The Best of Thomas Paine (2021) and Financial Exclusion (2019). He has also (co)authored numerous articles for important journals, including the American Economic ReviewBusiness History ReviewIndependent ReviewJournal of Private EnterpriseReview of Finance, and Southern Economic Review. Robert has taught business, economics, and policy courses at Augustana University, NYU’s Stern School of Business, Temple University, the University of Virginia, and elsewhere since taking his Ph.D. in History from SUNY Buffalo in 1997. Robert E. Wright was formerly a Senior Research Faculty at the American Institute for Economic Research.

Find Robert

  1. SSRN: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=362640
  2. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3792-3506
  3. Academia: https://robertwright.academia.edu/
  4. Google: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=D9Qsx6QAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra
  5. Twitter, Gettr, and Parler: @robertewright
  • The Danger of Economic Mismatches During the Opening

    With the air cleared and those who initiated the Great Suppression that created a Say’s Mismatch duly chastened, or chased out of office, America’s innovators might have enough confidence to match new consumer demands with new investments in new products designed for a post-COVID world. ~ Robert Wright

    The Danger of Economic Mismatches During the Opening
  • The Coming Flood of FOIA

    Without detailed knowledge of how specific elected officials thought through the coronavirus scare, knowledge only possible with La FOIA Grande, voters are essentially voting blind and will know no more about the two candidates they will be asked to choose between this November than they would about a randomly selected one.

    The Coming Flood of FOIA
  • The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s Decision Is Brilliant

    Wisconsin’s Supreme Court decided by a 4-3 vote on Wednesday May 13, 2020 to strike down the state’s “Safer at Home” order, its COVID-19 economic lockdown in other words. It did so completely, immediately, and unequivocally.

    The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s Decision Is Brilliant
  • We Are All Going To Die, and There’s Insurance for That

    All that prevents the formation of life-affirming private institutions like that described herein are regulations and taxes. Remove those impediments and watch free human beings flourish, even when faced by novel viruses, murder hornets, and much worse, until death inevitably overtakes them.

    We Are All Going To Die, and There’s Insurance for That
  • Yet Another Regulation that Blocked Widespread Testing

    Nebraska, one of the five free states and home to Warren Buffett, jettisoned the harmful regulation (which is more a redundancy than an oxymoron). So instead of using one testing kit per person, lab techs test five people at a time.

    Yet Another Regulation that Blocked Widespread Testing
  • How to Stop Food Shortages

    What Americans really have to fear are “anti-gouging” laws applied to food. If food prices are not allowed to rise when supply and demand conditions warrant, shortages will occur and, potentially, famine. It is difficult to believe that anyone has to make such a point in 2020, but that is where we are.

    How to Stop Food Shortages
  • We Need to Shut Them Down

    Governments messed up by not stopping the spread of the virus when it was still manageable, then did so again by shutting down too much of the economy for too long to cover their incompetence, and now they want to be rewarded with continued nonessential employment, and the forced redistribution of wealth from all Americans…

    We Need to Shut Them Down
  • Why Didn’t the Constitution Stop This?

    Once a federal court (especially SCOTUS, from which there is no appeal) declares a law unconstitutional, as SCOTUS has often done to state laws throughout US history, the political dynamic changes dramatically. States must comply or face that other side of federalism.

    Why Didn’t the Constitution Stop This?
  • Where Are the Reopening Experiments?

    Again, I think that most places could re-open now, and indeed should never have shut down in the first place, but if politicians insist on taking the cautious approach, they should at least have to provide some empirical evidence that re-opening would lead to a spike in deaths. The only way to do that is…

    Where Are the Reopening Experiments?
  • The Worst Public Policy in a Century

    America has implemented a lot of really bad policies since the New Deal and fought needless wars and endured long, senseless occupations of places like the Philippines and Afghanistan. But at least all those policies were vaguely constitutional. The economic lockdowns, by contrast, have turned the Constitution into a frail and worthless fabric.

    The Worst Public Policy in a Century