Shrink the State. End the Fed. Balance the budget. Make a profit. Leave an inheritance.
Gary North
Written by Robert Murphy on July 18, 2014
As I make clear in my recent interview with Tom Woods, I think that Bernanke painted himself (and the US economy) into a corner, then handed the paintbrush over to Janet Yellen. In case I sound “paranoid,” let’s review our history: ==> Paul Volcker took over as Chair of the Fed in August 1979. A […]
Continue reading →Written by Robert Murphy on July 11, 2014
The recently released Fed minutes contain the following information on their plans to fully complete the so-called taper: [P]articipants generally agreed that if incoming information continued to support its expectation of improvement in labor market conditions and a return of inflation toward its longer-run objective, it would be appropriate to complete asset purchases with a […]
Continue reading →Written by Robert Murphy on May 30, 2014
If you have the temerity to challenge calls for the government to take aggressive action to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, you will probably have someone call you a “climate science denier.” You will further be lectured that “97% of climate scientists agree” on this consensus. But there’s a bait-and-switch going on here, as Joseph Bast […]
Continue reading →Written by Robert Murphy on May 2, 2014
For some time now I’ve been trying to convey just how ludicrous it is that the US government’s anti-carbon policies are based on computer simulations of the global economic/climate system through the year 2300. A recent piece by David Kreutzer and Kevin Dayaratna (an economist and computer programmer, respectively, at the Heritage Foundation) is the […]
Continue reading →Written by Robert Murphy on April 18, 2014
The theory of business cycles advanced by Ludwig von Mises (and refined by Friedrich Hayek, who won the Nobel partially for this work) explains the typical recession as the inevitable result from a preceding, and unsustainable, boom period. The cause of the boom is artificially low interest rates, which in turn are caused by the […]
Continue reading →Written by Robert Murphy on March 21, 2014
On a conference call today with some people in the financial sector I made sure everyone was aware of this: I think a lot of casual observes (i.e. not the bond traders obviously) just think about the fed funds rate, and maybe the really short maturity Treasuries. But as the chart above shows (from here), […]
Continue reading →Written by Robert Murphy on January 16, 2014
The Economic Policy Institute has released a letter signed by 75 economists–including 7 winners of the Nobel (Memorial) Prize in economics–calling for the federal government to raise the national minimum wage from its current level of $7.25 to $10.10 by 2016. In this post I want to explain how this is possible, and why I […]
Continue reading →Written by Robert Murphy on December 27, 2013
My cousin has been asking me if I’m up to speed on the dangers of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). I explained to him that Paul Krugman had just declared that the TPP was no big deal, so I assumed it must be awful, but no–I didn’t really know much about it. After reading some of […]
Continue reading →Written by Robert Murphy on November 28, 2013
Apparently there is a growing backlash against big-box stores opening on Thanksgiving, with threats of boycott in the air: The list of big-box retailers opening their doors on Thanksgiving Day is growing, and so is the list of consumers threatening to shop elsewhere. Macy’s Inc. (NYSE:M) is joining the ranks of retailers offering turkey-day deals […]
Continue reading →Written by Robert Murphy on October 25, 2013
Big “showdowns” in Washington are always hype, with both sides distorting the facts so that the hapless citizen–whether he watches Fox or CNN–focuses on irrelevant details and misses the big picture. When it comes to the recurring conflict over raising the debt ceiling, here are two obvious facts that explode just about everything that the […]
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