I finished listening to an old EconTalk podcast, during my commute this morning. Russ Roberts was talking to Karol Boudreaux about her fieldwork on property rights and economic reforms in Rwanda and South Africa. They spent the first half of the conversation talking about Rwandan reforms and the second half talking about South African reforms. [...]
Who should you fear more, rich people or your local government bureaucrats? That’s an easy question. You should fear the nice lady down at Village Hall. She has far more control over your life than any member of the upper class.
Walter Williams states it beautifully.
Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, with about $60 billion [...]
It seems that some people get annoyed when used book sellers visit library book sales.
Book dealers armed with handheld ISBN scanners are threatening to take over the used book sales run by volunteer fundraising groups for the Madison Public Library system, Morris said. The scanners tell them how many copies [...]
Here’s another symbol of how rich our country is: the Aston Martin DB6 Couch:
This couch is an exact replica of an Aston Martin DB6 rear end. It’s painted in a classic Aston Martin color, Silver Birch. The red leather is finished off with a Y-stitch on each cushion. Polished to perfection, this [...]
Ever wondered how private roads might work? Drew Carey explains — and it really would be better than you think.
See?
Diet and Fat: A Severe Case of Mistaken Consensus – New York Times
In 1988, the surgeon general, C. Everett Koop, proclaimed ice cream to a be public-health menace right up there with cigarettes. Alluding to his office’s famous 1964 report on the perils of smoking, Dr. Koop announced that the American diet was [...]
One of the great things about the division of labor — having each person do one job and do it well — is the lengths to which complete strangers will go to make each others’ lives better.
Take, for example, road signs. We drive by thousands of them each year. Have you ever thought about what [...]
As seen on Slashdot
Garbage collection is fine as a private service, but roads? What would possibly improve by letting individual profit-seeking companies control where and when you are allowed to drive?
It’s a simple answer. Individual profit-seeking companies only make a profit if you can drive when and where you want. Right now, only [...]
America is so rich that it’s possible to make a living off of our trash. (You say wasteful, I say rich. It boils down to the same thing.) Madison’s Capital Times published an article about the burgeoning art of dumpster diving.
So much is discarded, in fact, that it is possible to live almost [...]
Wealth is created every day. Wealth is created when someone creates something new and fulfills a need that other people didn’t even realize was unfulfilled. Wealth is created when someone figures out how to produce an existing product faster or cheaper than it can currently be produced. Individuals innovate for several main reasons: to fulfill [...]