Free Markets

  • Power and the Main Threat to Liberty

    It used to be a cliche to observe that libertarianism is neither left nor right. I don’t hear that much anymore, so it needs to be restated. Mostly it needs to be understood. Left and right emerged in the 19th century as a revolt against liberalism. They each favored different forms of statism to push back…

    Power and the Main Threat to Liberty
  • Highlights from the GSMA’s 2017 Mobile Money Report

    The continued growth of mobile money should excite anyone who believes private sector innovations are the best means of achieving sustainable economic and financial development across the developing world.

    Highlights from the GSMA’s 2017 Mobile Money Report
  • Economics Gave Unified Culture a Mercy Killing

    The fall of the Oscars is only one sign of a larger trend. Technology fueled by economic considerations has given people more options than ever. We are curating culture according not to some mythical “national” sense of things but rather in accord with our individual preferences. This is happening now simply because we can. The…

    Economics Gave Unified Culture a Mercy Killing
  • This Toilet Plunger Reveals the Secret of Civilization

    There are many wonderful things in the world, but right now I want to talk about a product of the human mind that is a material celebration of the potential for creativity to overcome and rise above the state of nature. To put it briefly and simply, I’ve found a toilet plunger that embodies the…

    This Toilet Plunger Reveals the Secret of Civilization
  • Labor Markets Work When They Are Free

    Yes, I’m suggesting a series of dramatic changes to the way employment works. No more payroll tax. No more withholding. No more health-care mandates. No more mandates of any kind. And no more policing of either hiring or firing by the state. In other words, free the market. Economic exchange is about equal power between…

    Labor Markets Work When They Are Free
  • Centrally Planned Security Doesn’t Work Either

    If not armed teachers, if not gun-free zones, if not gun bans, if not granting to the government an exclusive domain for security and the threat of violence, what is the answer? The least satisfying answer is actually the right one: we do not know precisely how to secure schools. We – “we” as in…

    Centrally Planned Security Doesn’t Work Either
  • Earthquake Economics

    Let us not forget the contribution of free economies to making life safer. It wasn’t the regulations that made the difference. It was the innovations in the context of free enterprise.

    Earthquake Economics
  • Remember What the Internet Is All About

    Some great minds are remembered mostly for one moment in time, a momentous action or revelatory piece of writing. Such is the case for John Perry Barlow, who died on February 7, 2018. Born in 1947, he was a remarkable visionary, a lyricist for the Grateful Dead who later became a founder of the Electronic…

    Remember What the Internet Is All About
  • If You Love Progress, Embrace Markets

    People talk often of how technology is disruptive. That’s only part of the story. Technology also serves the oldest values and the most ancient aspirations of the human experience, and does so in a way that is organically peaceful with how we live. It’s the much-maligned market economy that makes it all possible, and does…

    If You Love Progress, Embrace Markets
  • What’s Wrong with Copyright and How to Fix It

    To my mind, Creative Commons is an imperfect solution to a major problem, while the best solution would simply leave the whole problem of production, ownership, and attribution to the market itself. But that is not the world we yet live in. Until then, it’s a beautiful thing that the market has found a stop-gap…

    What’s Wrong with Copyright and How to Fix It
  • Civil Asset Forfeiture Undermines Free Enterprise and Human Dignity

    Private property rights are the foundation of free enterprise. Without property rights trade will be suppressed and pushed underground. Growth is strangled and good people resort to dealing with corrupt officials and black market sellers just to get through their lives. We are all made worse off when authorities have excessive discretion, and without proof…

    Civil Asset Forfeiture Undermines Free Enterprise and Human Dignity
  • What Has Government Done to Our Bathrooms?

    The net effect of all of this has been to ruin our bathrooms. You might not realize it because the change has been slow, extending over 25 years. Only by encountering a bathroom with original fixtures from the 1940s can you perceive the full horror of what has happened. Our showers are lame, our toilets…

    What Has Government Done to Our Bathrooms?