Bryan Caplan's Blog, page 51

Triple Standards: The Dollar, the Throne, and the Altar

The last chapter of Tyler’s Big Business is called “If Business Is So Good, Why Is It So Disliked?”  At risk of seeming narcissistic, this passage put a big grin on my face:

Perhaps in part because we cannot do without business, so many people hate or resent business, and they love to criticize it, mock it, and lower its status. Business just bugs them. After I explained the premise of this book to one of my colleagues, Bryan Caplan, he shrieked to me: “But, but . . . how can people be ungrat...

The Noble Crony: Big Business on the Politics of Business

Tyler’s Big Business insists that the influence of business over American government is greatly overblown:

I am against virtually all manifestations of crony capitalism, but I’m also not sure people are getting the basic story right. Business does have some real political pull, but the basic view that big business is “pulling the strings” in Washington is one of the big myths of our time. On closer inspection, most American political decisions are not in fact shaped by big business, even thou...

Could Such a Man Care?

Nicolas Maduro now rules a land of chronic hunger, horrific crime, terrible fear, and mass exodus.  How does he maintain his dictatorship?  With a pact of steel between his ruling party, the military, the secret police, and on-site foreign allies – especially Cubans.  You would have to be mad to think that Maduro’s doing all this for the good of his people, or the good of the world.  His only credible motivation is power-lust gone wild.  Maduro is a pervert for power.

He’ll never admit this,...

Rollback: What’s Missing from Big Business

While there’s much to like in Tyler Cowen’s Big Business, I doubt it will inspire anyone.  Why not?  Because he spends a whole book praising business, but almost totally ignores an obvious question: “If business is so great, why should we settle for ‘containment‘ of anti-business policies, rather than full-blown ‘rollback?'”  If Tyler means what he says, it seems like he’d want to free business from (some of) the shackles of government regulation – and hand (some) government functions over to...

Big Business: Recasting the Anti-Hero

Tyler Cowen’s previous book, Stubborn Attachments, is right in general, but wrong on particulars.  His latest book, in contrast, is largely right on both.  The world needed a new book to be pro-market and pro-business at the same time, and Tyler’s Big Business delivers the package.  I’m almost tempted to quote Keynes:

In my opinion it is a grand book … Morally and philosophically I find myself in agreement with virtually the whole of it: and not only in agreement with it, but in deeply moved...

Governing Least Round-up

In case you missed any installment of my five-part series on Dan Moller’s wonderful Governing Least, here’s a full inventory:

1. Overview of the book’s thesis and central arguments.

2. What’s wrong with utilitarianism.

3. A litany of insight.

4. Moller’s immigration oversight.

5. Incorrectness on political correctness.

Above all, though, read this great book!

 

The post Governing Least Round-up appeared first on Econlib.

Governing Least: Incorrectness on Political Correctness

When I saw Dan Moller’s chapter on “Dilemmas of Political Correctness,” I thought I knew what he was going to say.  I thought he was going to say something like, “We should all have good manners, but the demands of so-called ‘social justice’ are unreasonable and unfair.”  Indeed, I half-expected him to offer another imaginary speech echoing those in his first chapter.  Something along the lines of:

Imagine calling a town hall meeting and delivering the following speech:

My dear assembled ci...

You Have No Right to Your Culture

Most complaints about immigration are declarative: “Immigrants take our jobs.”  “Immigrants abuse the welfare state.”  “Immigrants won’t learn English.’  “Immigrants will vote for Sharia.”  One complaint, however, is usually phrased as a question: “But don’t people have a right to their culture?”  When people so inquire, their tone is usually conciliatory, as if to say, “Surely, even you will accept this.”  My considered judgment, however, is that this challenge is a true Trojan Horse.  No on...

Governing Least‘s Immigration Oversight

Dan Moller’s Governing Least barely mentions immigration.  But it should have, because of its strong implications for this hugely important issue.  Applying Moller’s approach, there is not only a moral presumption in favor of open borders, but a host of residual obligations that accompany even justified restrictions on immigration.

Recall that Moller’s libertarianism highlights the effrontery of extra-libertarian moral demands:

Imagine calling a town hall meeting and delivering the following...

Governing Least: A Litany of Insight

Dan Moller’s Governing Least is packed with random insights and philosophic wit.  Some highlights:

Why so much political philosophy sounds desperate:

Only those already unsympathetic to utilitarianism are likely to be swayed by Rawls’s brief observations. Those who begin their political philosophy by defending the morality of rights don’t so much preach to the choir as exorcize the elect.

Why so much political philosophy sounds so blind:

The reason France does not require aid is not because s...