All Posts Tagged With: "regulation"
The Mystique of Hedge Funds
Hedge funds are controversial these days. Though it’s unlikely that the average citizen or the average congressman could say just what hedge funds do, many are certain they must be reined in by additional regulation because they can—and do—cause widespread damage to our financial system. Almost everyone takes it for granted that regulation of some sort [...]
23Oct2009 | Warren C. Gibson | 0 comments | ContinuedGetting in Deeper
In what the Wall Street Journal calls "a watershed moment for government intervention in the private sector," the Federal Reserve announced yesterday it will regulate executive compensation at all banks so that they will not have incentives to take on too much risk. The term "pretence of knowledge" comes to mind.
23Oct2009 | Sheldon Richman | 19 comments | ContinuedMeltdown: A Free-Market Look at Why the Stock Market Collapsed, the Economy Tanked, and Government Bailouts Will Make Things Worse
Thomas Woods’s Meltdown is a marvel of writing and publishing. Having arrived on shelves in February, it offers a complete analysis of the causes of the current recession as well as a critical assessment of the mistakes policymakers have already made, and will likely continue to make, in response to the economic decline.
The marvel is [...]
Free-Marketeers Should Welcome Regulation?
In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, Paul Singer, chairman of the Manhattan Institute, suggests that “there is an urgent need for a new global regulatory initiative” to address the causes of the worldwide financial collapse and that even those who appreciate the qualities of free markets should welcome the new and different regulations he proposes [...]
23Sep2009 | Peter Lewin | 0 comments | ContinuedIf You Really Love Volunteers, Mr. Obama . . .
Barack Obama gave volunteerism a big boost early this year, visiting service centers on Martin Luther King Day, greeting volunteers, and working alongside them. “Everybody’s got to be involved,” he said. “If we’re waiting for somebody else to do something, it never gets done. We’re going to have to take responsibility, all of us.”
These are [...]
A Family of Heroes
In any major city, particularly a capital, the great majority of statues and memorials pay tribute to monarchs and presidents, priests, generals, and statesmen. This reflects the way history is commonly understood and taught: as the story of the achievements of those associated with political power, government, and war. Memorials to the historical figures associated [...]
23Sep2009 | Stephen Davies | 5 comments | ContinuedThe Real Meaning of Privilege
“They live in an expensive mansion, fly first-class to foreign countries, and eat at the finest restaurants. They send their kids to private schools. They’re so privileged.” How often have you heard some variant of the lines above? I’d bet it’s a lot. Yet, typically, the word “privileged” is inaccurate. We certainly all know or [...]
23Sep2009 | David R. Henderson | 6 comments | ContinuedThe Myth of Unregulated Tobacco
On June 22, President Obama signed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act (FSPTCA), a law that gives the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulatory authority over tobacco products. The law requires the FDA to develop a new tobacco-regulation center with all related costs to be covered by fees paid by the industry. [...]
19Aug2009 | Bruce Yandle | 0 comments | ContinuedBad Regulation Drives Out Good
In 1969 economist Harold Demsetz identified a flaw in much public policy analysis, the “Nirvana Fallacy”:
“The view that now pervades much public policy economics implicitly presents the relevant choice as between an ideal norm and an existing ‘imperfect’ institutional arrangement. This nirvana approach differs considerably from a comparative institution approach in which the relevant choice is [...]
Government Must Keep Track of Derivatives?
Regardless of what caused the crisis, government efforts to regulate derivatives will only lock in undesirable aspects of the current market and ensure that politically connected players reap artificial gains. It is absurd to ask politicians to promote financial integrity and sound accounting. They are the worst violators of these principles on the planet.
17Jun2009 | Robert P. Murphy | 3 comments | ContinuedThe “Watchful Eye” Fallacy
Because they are made of the same human stuff, it is unreasonable to expect government officials to correct errors being made in the marketplace. A look at the market failures Obama alluded to in his speech bears this out. Take the speculative bubble in housing. Did senators see the danger before the rest of us and pass laws to limit the purchase of real estate? Of course not. They participated in the housing boom along with everyone else.
21May2009 | James L. Payne | 1 comment | ContinuedThe Trillion Dollar Meltdown: Easy Money, High Rollers, and the Great Credit Crash
The stocks of banks, investment banks, and associated financial institutions declined severely in 2007-08 when their many bad loans, first in subprime mortgages and then in other securities, surfaced. Scholars will be pondering this event for years to come, as they have with the Great Depression.
In this instant and brief history, Charles Morris, lawyer, banker, [...]
Black Swans, Butterflies, and the Economy
One side blames the market. The other blames government. We get two causal stories going in opposite directions and a lot of animus. But both perhaps are missing something important in this titanic debate about our current financial crisis. It’s time we exposed a complicated truth about the economy of the 21st century.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb [...]
What Happened to Market Discipline?
During the late presidential campaign Barack Obama said, “[Today’s economic problems are] a stark reminder of the failures of . . . an economic philosophy that sees any regulation at all as unwise and unnecessary.”
What? Does that mean that until last fall the Bush administration embraced the free market? Nonsense. Governments at all levels have [...]
Poker and the Free Market
Good poker players are like entrepreneurs: You need greater skill than average to anticipate the future. As Mises so cogently puts it in Human Action, “What distinguishes the successful entrepreneur and promoter from other people is precisely the fact that he does not let himself be guided by what was and is, but arranges his affairs on the ground of his opinion about the future. He sees the past and the present as other people do; but he judges the future in a different way.”
20Jan2009 | Robert Stewart | 0 comments | ContinuedRaw Milk and the Sour State
Whether it is an expensive organic brand or simply carries a mega-chain store name, that milk has undergone pasteurization and homogenization. There is a growing subset of consumers who would prefer not to buy their milk this way. They want it unpasteurized, unhomogenized—in a word, “raw.”
20Jan2009 | William E. Pike | 6 comments | ContinuedOn Baseball and Capital Markets
Donald F. Grunewald is an attorney.
Baseball is a game of rules. These rules are not excessively complex for the simple reason that overregulation and overspecification would hamper the enjoyment of the game. How so?
Consider the placement of the defensive players. Other than the pitcher and catcher, who must stand at particular locations while a pitch [...]
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The End of Prosperity: How Higher Taxes Will Doom the Economy–If We Let it Happen
By Arthur B. Laffer, Stephen Moore, and Peter J. Tanous
