by Craig Ladwig When a business looks to relocate in your community, the economic-development types will make its owners aware of favors that the political establishment can bestow. These will represent fixed or political capital — tax-increment financing, rebates, zoning exceptions, access to the mayor’s office, an inside track to municipal contracts, that sort of thing. But a willingness to spend someone else’s money on strategies of legal corruption is hardly in demand. Everybody does…

by T. Norman Van Cott, Ph.D. There are two primary reasons for economists’ opposition to tariffs. First, by raising U.S. prices of imports, tariffs encourage high-cost domestic production of import substitutes. This production would be uneconomic in the tariffs’ absence. Cost measures what people sacrifice to obtain a particular objective, so substituting higher cost domestic production for lower cost imports means more of other things are given up to get those items. Giving up more…

by Mark Franke “I have seen the future, and it works!” wrote the journalist Lincoln Steffens after visiting the Soviet Union in 1919. Except that it didn’t. Why bring this up now, nearly 30 years after the fall of the USSR and its communist- totalitarian system of repression and deprivation? Because a new generation of political rock stars have been anointed by a slavering press, rock stars who gush on about how socialism is what…

by Eric Schansberg, Ph.D. Andrew Yang is one of many Democratic candidates for U.S. President in 2020. Unlike most of his competitors, Yang is intelligent and sounds like a policy wonk. He’s eloquent and brims with joy. He’s thoughtful about policy and worried about both people and society. But Yang is a mess on many issues, so why write about him? We should applaud candidates who talk about public policy in a thoughtful way. In…

by Leo Morris Let’s cut to the chase on our current relapse into anti-Electoral College fever. No matter what high-minded reasons partisans espouse, many also all have selfish motivations for their positions. A great number of Electoral College opponents are liberals and/or Democrats who believe an end to the current system will ensure the election of liberals and/or Democrats to the presidency forever and ever. A great number of Electoral College supporters are conservatives and/or…

“Liberalism is piecemeal socialism, and socialism always attacks three institutions: religion, family and property. Religion, because it offers a rival authority to the State; family, because it means a rival loyalty to the State; property, because it means independence to the State.” — Joe Sobran PETER BUTTIGIEG’S PROMOTION of socialist policies in his presidential campaign begins by dismissing the concerns of an older generation, one more familiar with the past failures — nay, disasters —…

by Joe Squadrito Recently the national media has focused on sheriffs in some western states who either openly oppose or defy gun-control legislation enacted by their respective legislatures. The broadcast media, in some cases portrayed these sheriffs as openly defiant individuals in violation of their state laws and essentially in violation of their oath of office. These journalists are unaware of, or choose to ignore, the historic and constitutional provision attached to the office of…

by David Penticuff It is frustrating to see elected officials line up in unity to hand over more than $3 million in tax money to assist a company that in my city, by all appearances, does not truly need the money. But it’s not really about Central Indiana Ethanol (CIE). When asked why we are doing this, the elected officials involved just say the company’s past TIF was “one of the good ones” out of…

“For they sow the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.” (Hosea 8:7 ASV) by Mark Franke The prophet Hosea was warning the people of his nation, Old Testament Israel, that their actions had consequences, consequences that would be much worse than they could possibly expect. Think wind. Then think whirlwind. As our public discourse somehow manages to get worse and worse almost daily, one can’t help but wonder if a whirlwind is in the…

by Eric Schansberg, Ph.D. The university admissions scandal “Operation Varsity Blues” is interesting on many levels: rich people working the system; corruption and bribery in institutions of higher learning; elite, liberal universities sullied by scandal and greed. But as an economist, the episode brings other comparisons to mind. First, consider how the scandal resembles both “legacy admissions” and “Affirmative Action,” two other strange aspects of university admissions. In all of these cases, students are able…