Bryan Caplan's Blog, page 2

Why Can’t Everything Be Free?

“Why can’t everything be free?”  I’m always delighted whenever a child asks me, because I have an intellectually solid answer even a child can understand.  Namely: If everyone had to produce for free, there would be virtually nothing to buy.  If everything had a price of zero, consumers would strive to fill their shopping carts with anything they could get their hands on.  Producers, however, would basically stop working. 

(To be clear, this assumes that government strictly enforces this disast...

Hanania Highlights, III

Chapter 5 of Public Choice Theory and the Illusion of Grand Strategy taught me the most.  Hanania provides a great survey of what we know about the effects of trade sanctions – and then gets meta.

He starts by emphasizing the terrible harm of sanctions.  “Humanitarian” exceptions mean little in practice:

Sanctions regimes that target the economy of a country usually have humanitarian exceptions. Despite this, other regulations usually serve to limit their effectiveness. For example, federal law ...

Thanks for Less Than Nothing

I know a guy who keeps getting hassled by his Human Resources Department.  Why?  Because he hasn’t submitted his official vacation paperwork.

What’s the big deal?  It’s paperwork, and like most people, he hates paperwork.

If the paperwork is so hateful, why does it exist?  Because the firm is located in a city where regulators require such paperwork, to ensure that every employee gets all the vacation they’re entitled to.

Upshot: Due to regulation, this guy has to fill out piles of paperwork in ...

Hanania Highlights, II

Continuing from earlier this week.  Military rivalry combined with economic cooperation is hard – but not impossible – to reconcile with “grand strategy.”

Of course, in neither case were those who advocated for economic ties with the Soviet Union or China, or their intellectual opponents, devoid of rational arguments. Indeed, the similarities between the two cases are striking, with many in the United States calling for a civilizing mission toward the communist rival. Yet I show in this chapter ...

Caplan Interviews Hanania

During my recent visit to Austin, I interviewed Richard Hanania for the Salem Center’s podcast.  Very wide-ranging, hence the title: “The Politics of Everything.”  Enjoy!

The post Caplan Interviews Hanania appeared first on Econlib.

Hanania Highlights, I

Richard Hanania’s new Public Choice Theory and the Illusion of Grand Strategy is an eye-opening contrarian take on the academic discipline of  “international relations.”  It is a self-conscious critique of the so-called “realist” view that countries maximize their long-run national interest.  In the next three posts, I’ll share some highlights.

The central argument:

[T]his book argues that both primacy and liberal internationalism are labels put on a collection of policies that are not primar...

Hypocrisy Versus Social Desirability Bias

Due to Social Desirability Bias, governments habitually impose bad policies that sound good.  Identity trumps prosperity.  Health trumps fun.  Safety trumps convenience.  And demagogues rule the world. 

One of the most rhetorically powerful antidotes, as I’ve argued, is to appeal to freedom.  Don’t say, “Money matters more than patriotism,” “Vacations matter more than pandemics,” or “I can’t be bothered to follow these safety rules.”  Instead, when you want prosperity, fun, and convenience, cry...

Caplan-Callard, The Case Against Education at U Chicago

Last October, Agnes Callard interviewed me at the University of Chicago on The Case Against Education.  I genuinely think it was the best audience I ever had the privilege to address.  Enjoy!

The post Caplan-Callard, The Case Against Education at U Chicago appeared first on Econlib.

The Philosophy of Roadkill

Most vegans still drive.  Should they?  Driving almost inevitably leads to roadkill on a massive scale.  A painful way to go.  Via Vox:

No one really knows how often animals are killed by cars in the US. But one thing’s clear: it happens a lot.

There are about 253,000 reported animal-vehicle accidents per year (that is, accidents that are substantial enough to cause damage to the car). Last year, State Farm estimated that about 1.2 million deer were killed by cars in total.

 

When you ...

Inflation Is Still Too Low

Inflation just hit 7%.  But in an important sense, that’s still too low.  Prices need to rise more – and the sooner, the better.

I know that sounds crazy, but hear me out.  I’m not saying that we need more monetary or fiscal stimulus.  Quite the opposite.  Aggregate Demand policy has been absurdly expansionary for over a year.

The reason why we need more inflation is simple: ubiquitous shortages.  This problem isn’t merely on the news; at this point, something I want to buy is unavailable prac...