Archive for David R. Henderson

David Henderson is a research fellow with the Hoover Institution and an economics professor at the Graduate School of Business and Public Policy, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California. He is editor of The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics (Liberty Fund) and blogs at econlib.org.

Pharmaceutical Profits and Health Are Inconsistent?

In a critical review of Richard Epstein’s book Overdose: How Excessive Government Regulation Stifles Pharmaceutical Innovation, Arnold Relman (The New Republic, July 30) criticizes drug companies for their hypocrisy. Contrasting the companies’ message to stockholders with their message to the larger world, he quotes Pfizer President Jeffrey Kindler’s statement that his goal is “to create [...]

1Nov2007 | David R. Henderson | 0 comments | Continued

Our Skyrocketing Living Standards

In the mid-1950s, when I was a young child, I would occasionally see a man walking along the street with a grapefruit-size growth in his throat. The first time I saw such a thing I gasped. My mother hushed me up and told me later that the man had a goiter. The last time I [...]

1Sep2007 | David R. Henderson | 0 comments | Continued

The Pursuit of Happiness ~ Milton Friedman: A Personal Tribute

David Henderson (davidrhenderson1950@gmail.com) is a research fellow with the Hoover Institution and an economics professor at the Graduate School of Business and Public Policy at the Naval Postgraduate School. His latest book, co-authored with Charles L. Hooper, is Making Great Decisions in Business and Life (Chicago Park Press, 2006). So much has been written about [...]

1May2007 | David R. Henderson | 2 comments | Continued

Big Government–Big Risk

In his Freeman column last June, “The End Run to Freedom,” economist Russell Roberts makes the following argument: As people get wealthier, they demand more security. Their demand for security leads many people to favor the welfare state or the nanny state. The welfare state refers to a government that subsidizes people who bear losses; [...]

1Jan2007 | David R. Henderson | 11 comments | Continued

John Kenneth Galbraith: A Criticism and an Appreciation

Last April John Kenneth Galbraith died at the age of 97. Galbraith was one of America ‘s most famous economists and a self-proclaimed liberal (in the American sense of “statist” rather than in the European sense of “believer in freedom”). His fame came not from his technical accomplishments in academic economics but from his awesome [...]

1Dec2006 | David R. Henderson | 29 comments | Continued

Raising the Minimum Wage Will Discourage Migration? It Just Aint So!

In “Raise Wages, Not Walls,” an op-ed in the July 25 New York Times, Michael Dukakis and Daniel Mitchell make a proposal that is breathtaking in its misunderstanding of basic economics. After showing problems with the various congressional proposals to limit illegal immigration, they give their own solution: increase the minimum wage. They write, “If [...]

1Nov2006 | David R. Henderson | 2 comments | Continued

Only the Rich Are Getting Richer? It Just Ain’t So!

“In an era when the rich are the only income group getting richer,” begins an article in the April 13 Washington Post. (Blaine Harden, “As the Rich Ride In, Many Are Priced Out of Homes on the Range.”) But in this one 13-word statement, versions of which have become so common in conversations and newspaper [...]

1Aug2006 | David R. Henderson | 0 comments | Continued

We Need Medical Rationing?

In a recent op-ed in the Los Angeles Times (“A Health Care Prescription that’s Hard to Swallow,” January 30, 2006), Henry Aaron, a well-known health econ­omist at the Brookings Institution, made the following argument: Spending on health care in the United States is rising as a percent of GDP and could go from its current [...]

1May2006 | David R. Henderson | 0 comments | Continued

We Need a Stiff Oil Tax?

In an article last fall in the Washington Post, one of my favorite economic journalists, Robert J. Samuelson, argued for “a stiff oil tax” and “stricter fuel economy standards” (September 14, 2005). His rationale for this increased government intervention is that “we are vulnerable to any major cutoff of oil.” We can reduce our vulnerability, [...]

1Mar2006 | David R. Henderson | 0 comments | Continued

Income Mobility: Alive and Well

As Rich-Poor Gap Widens in the U.S., Class Mobility Stalls,” blares the headline on page one of the May 13 Wall Street Journal.When you see such a headline, wouldn’t you think it means that the income mobility of Americans is no longer as great as it was? That’s what we tend to think when we [...]

1Oct2005 | David R. Henderson | 1 comment | Continued

Why the Social Security Tax Cap Shouldn’t Be Raised

In recent months Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, has suggested making all earned income up to $200,000 subject to the Social Security (FICA) tax. The current maximum on which Americans pay the tax is $90,000. This maximum rises every year based on a government estimate of real wage growth in the recent [...]

1Jun2005 | David R. Henderson | 1 comment | Continued

Economics in One Lesson: An Appreciation

“The art of economics consists in looking not merely at the immediate but at the longer effects of any act or policy; it consists in tracing the consequences of that policy not merely for one group but for all groups.” So writes Henry Hazlitt in chapter one of his classic, Economics in One Lesson. I [...]

1Nov2004 | David R. Henderson | 0 comments | Continued

More Free Than Ever?

In a November 2002 Washington Times column titled “Americans Enjoy More Freedom Today Than Ever,” Jonah Goldberg stated, “Today, we worry desperately about our personal and political freedom even though we are more free today than at any time in our history.” Attempts to measure freedom are inherently difficult because we must weight our freedoms [...]

1Mar2003 | David R. Henderson | 0 comments | Continued

Enron Shows Need for More Regulation?

In his December 24, 2001, Business Week column, journalist Robert Kuttner claimed the Enron scandal “suggests the need for tougher regulation.” That Kuttner would make such a statement is not surprising; he consistently advocates increasing the government’s power over our economic lives. But even many people who are generally sympathetic to economic freedom are questioning [...]

1Jul2002 | David R. Henderson | 0 comments | Continued

In Memoriam: Yale Brozen

On March 4, at age 80, Yale Brozen, a prominent free-market economist, died. For a large part of his career, Brozen was a professor of business economics at the University of Chicago, where he was a colleague of Nobel prize winners Merton Miller and the late George Stigler and other members of the so-called “Chicago [...]

1Jun1998 | David R. Henderson | 1 comment | Continued

The Legal Assault on Competence and Honesty

In October 1993, when Northwest Airlines announced that it had agreed to rehire pilot Norman Prouse as a ground trainer, a company spokesman acknowledged that “some Northwest employees might be bitter.” The reason: three years earlier, Mr. Prouse, after an all-night drinking binge with the two members of his flying crew, had flown a plane [...]

1Oct1997 | David R. Henderson | 1 comment | Continued

Property Rights in the Family and Beyond

In 1991, when I was putting together The Fortune Encyclopedia of Economics, an economist friend sent me a story from the Sesame Street Parent’s Guide. I liked it so much that I had my research assistant, Janet Beales, write a shortened version for the Encyclopedia. We titled it Property Rights for Sesame Street. Here’s the [...]

1Feb1997 | David R. Henderson | 0 comments | Continued
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