Donald Trump proudly proclaims himself Tariff Man, and whether Ms. Harris calls herself Tariff Woman or not, the Harris/Biden Administration left most of Mr. Trump’s tariffs in place, so she is still a Tariff Woman. Writing in the WSJ, Michael Levy helpfully notes (HT Cafe Hayek): Tariffs are fees charged on goods imported by U.S. […]
Archives
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Note to Tariff Man (and wannabe Tariff Woman!)
26 Jul 2024
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Donald Trump proudly claimed that “I am a Tariff Man!”, falsely suggesting that imports impoverish us: Mr. Trump and Mr. Bernie Sanders are in unity: protecting industries from foreign competitors is the way to create a great economy (although even Mr. Sanders understood the folly of starting a trade war with Canada, strongly disagreeing with […]
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In the case of the Hollywood writers’ strike, who has the moral high ground? Many have seen the consistent refrain that Hollywood executives are taking advantage of poor, overworked writers via streaming culture changes and AI’s rise.* Hollywood studio executives are trying to cut costs to preserve profits in a new and changing environment for […]
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Chile’s New Direction
26 Dec 2021
This year, Gabriel Boric won the Chilean Presidency by riding a populist wave of anti-market sentiment. Populism is a political tool not tied to any particular ideology, and it can drive people to very dangerous conclusions. In this case, Boric convinced Chile that the rich elites maintained power in his nation at the expense of […]
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Don’t Tax Me! I’m Irish!
25 Jul 2021
The Biden administration seeks to form an international agreement to establish a global minimum corporate tax at 15%. According to CNN, 132 nations back the proposal, but some notable holdouts including Ireland, block the way. The EU needs to vote unanimously to pass the proposal, so as long Ireland opposes it, there’s no deal. Over […]
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The Perfect Time to De-Tariff
24 May 2021
The other day I read a Wall Street Journal piece about EU tariffs on U.S. goods that (thankfully) never came to be. It reminded me about the Trump administration’s departure from U.S. policy for the last few decades which generally aimed to increase free trade. The Biden administration has yet to make any strong changes […]
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I Don’t Want To Play Your Zero Sum Game
08 Apr 2021
You don’t have to care about Marvel movies to understand this post, but my wife and I were watching Falcon and The Winter Soldier last week, and something hit me the wrong way. The group of terrorists The Falcon is trying to stop believed the world was better off after Thanos snapped half of all […]
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Bing’s Big Day
22 Oct 2020
I’m sure no one was surprised by the DOJ’s antitrust lawsuit against Google. Someone who handles over 80% of domestic internet queries is definitely a monopoly, right?! Even better, Chrome controls about 70% of global browser traffic, 85% of the world’s smartphones run on Android, and Google receives 63% of search engine ad revenue in […]
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If it’s indeed “the economy stupid,” its hard for me to see anything that derails his reelection, and that likely convincingly (especially if the nominee is Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders). The yawning drama of the impeachment may have something to say about it of course. But I doubt it. The predetermined impeachment is simply […]
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It used to be possible to say something of the effect, “be wary of Republicans when they don’t do what they say they believe in, be wary of Democrats when they do do what they believe in.” Democrats may have had good intentions, but their policy prescriptions were generally in the wrong direction (certainly economically). […]