Capital Letters
Must a Formal Legal System Come Before Prosperity?
Capital Letters It was disheartening to read John Stossel’s uncritical endorsement of Hernando de Soto’s diagnosis of the causes of poverty in Third World nations as their lack of street addresses and legal titles to property (“Why Do the Poor Stay Poor?,” March 2011). The error of these claims in De Soto’s The Mystery of [...]
25May2011 | Foundation for Economic Education | 0 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters
“Economic Freedom of the World” Doesn’t Endorse Free Trade Agreements As two of the principal authors of the Economic Freedom of the World (EFW) index published by the Fraser Institute, we might be accused of being overly defensive when it comes to criticisms of such indexes. For this reason, we typically choose to remain silent [...]
21Apr2011 | Foundation for Economic Education | 1 comment | ContinuedDoes Saving Reduce GDP?
Warren C. Gibson’s article, “GDP: Who Needs It?” in the May 2010 edition of the Freeman, asserts an inconsistency. He correctly denigrates the Keynesian notion of promoting consumption spending as a means of promoting GDP growth: “The predominance of consumption seems to have spawned the bizarre notion that if we can only get consumer spending [...]
24Nov2010 | and James C. W. Ahiakpor | 2 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters
Can We Really Do Without FDIC? Warren Gibson’s otherwise interesting article, “Federal Deposit Insurance: A Banking System Built on Sand” (The Freeman, June 2010), contains at least three errors. One is that “the Fed, out of confusion, failed to inject new money” during the time of the Hoover administration. Not so. Federal Reserve notes increased [...]
25Aug2010 | mnolan | 1 comment | ContinuedLeviathan: The Growth of Local Government and the Erosion of Liberty
Does government have too much power? Certainly—just think of all the freedom Americans have lost on account of the income tax, Social Security, Department of Labor regulations, the threat of antitrust prosecution, and so on. Note that in my short list of examples, each one is due to action by the federal government. In Leviathan, [...]
12Jul2010 | George C. Leef | 0 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters
Was There Money in the Original “Star Trek”? To the Editor: In the December 2004 issue of The Freeman, P. Gardner Goldsmith criticizes “Star Trek” for foolishly postulating that we could do without money. He presents us with an argument of the following structure: X is stupid; someone told him that “Star Trek” creator Gene [...]
8Jul2010 | FEE Admin | 0 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters
Where Is the Dollar Defined? To the Editor: I was belatedly reading in the November 2003 issue of Ideas on Liberty when I came across something that caught my eye. This was the statement in George Leef’s book review of Pieces of Eight by Edwin Vieira, Jr., claiming that the Constitution defined a dollar as [...]
6Jul2010 | FEE Admin | 0 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters
Don’t Let the Court Off the Hook To the Editor: As a former wartime draftee — the Korean War — I’m of two minds re Aeon J. Skoble’s “Neither Slavery Nor Involuntary Servitude” piece in your September issue (“It Just Ain’t So!). No question, he did a very good job of picking apart the operational [...]
6Jul2010 | FEE Admin | 1 comment | ContinuedCapital Letters
Can There Be Free Trade in a Mixed Economy? To the Editor: Although I don’t see any flaws in your arguments about the theory of free trade in your column for the April 2004 issue of The Freeman, you should at least acknowledge the distortions in most any nation’s economy because of government intervention and [...]
5Jul2010 | FEE Admin | 0 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters
Who Is a Mormon? As a long-time reader and supporter of The Freeman, I express my enjoyment in reading the articles by Dr. Thomas Szasz. I appreciate his critical thinking and his skill in constructing the written word in a most efficient and powerful style. However, I take issue with part of his December 2009 [...]
24Mar2010 | mnolan | 2 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters, March 2010
Is Intellectual Property Real Property? I feel I must respond to Kevin Carson’s article “How ‘Intellectual Property’ Impedes Competition” (The Freeman, October 2009). In his article Mr. Carson suggests that intellectual property is different than real property in that real property comes into existence in limited supply. I do not believe this to be true [...]
23Feb2010 | mnolan | 2 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters
Did World War II Help End the Great Depression? Much as I admire Robert Higgs’s work, I suggest clarifying two points he makes in the October 2008 Freeman. Higgs says that World War II did not end the Great Depression; genuine prosperity did not return until after the war. But the Depression did give way to [...]
19Aug2009 | mnolan | 0 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters
Is Greenspan Really Innocent of Causing the Housing Boom? David Henderson and Jeff Hummel have written a remarkably pro-Greenspan article, “Was Money Really Easy Under Greenspan?” (www.tinyurl.com/cuf3ug). The authors overlooked several points that would undermine their portrayal of Fed chairman Alan Greenspan as an anti-inflationist and the best Fed chairman ever. (Better than Paul Volcker?) [...]
21May2009 | mnolan | 0 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters — Does Utilitarianism Deserve Bashing?
In an otherwise meritorious article (“The ‘Risk’ of Liberty: Criminal Law in the Welfare State,” September 2008), Michael N. Giuliano parrots the tiresome old bashing of utilitarian ethics. (He sometimes says “consequentialism,” but since versions of utilitarianism make up almost the entire set of consequentialist doctrines, the distinction is unnecessary here.) “The main component of [...]
27Apr2009 | mnolan | 2 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters — Is Energy Independence Desirable?
Is Energy Independence Desirable? I thought that the title of the article by David R. Henderson, “Let’s Not Be Energy Independent,” in the October 2008 issue was shocking, and the content of the article did nothing to allay my concerns. The author seems to think that one achieves independence by tariffs and import controls. He [...]
2Apr2009 | mnolan | 0 comments | ContinuedHow Rapidly Should the Money Supply Grow?
I would like to make one correction to Howard Baetjer’s article “Inflation 101” (September). The author suggests that inflation results when the money supply expands faster than the rate at which goods and services are produced. The author correctly points out that this expansion of the money supply will lead to rising prices. But inflation [...]
22Jan2009 | Mike Van Winkle | 0 comments | ContinuedCapital Letters
What Do We Do About the Subsidy of History? I concurred on one point with “The Subsidy of History” by Kevin Carson (June 2008). It is not sound to view the historical development of capitalism as though it evolved strictly by fairness, without including the vices of mankind. Surely history is better stated by Burton [...]
1Nov2008 | FEE Admin | 1 comment | Continued-
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