The Economic Kindness of In-Kind Donations
The popular humor website “Cracked.com” recently published a thought provoking article entitled “5 Popular Forms of Charity (That Aren’t Helping).” The five charitable activities mentioned were (1) awareness campaigns, (2) donating clothing, (3) choosing your charity based on its overhead, (4) earmarking donations, (5) volunteering after disasters. The author’s arguments for why each of these […]
Banknotes and fractional reserve
Economist Larry White at George Mason University submitted a thought-provoking written testimony the other day. Discussing the issue of fractional reserve banking before the House Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy and Technology, he made the following claim: For payment by account transfer, FRB offers a more economic way of providing payment services. A money warehouse […]
Krugman does not understand Austrian Economics
The title should be no surprise by now. Paul Krugman–arch-Keynesian–is once again misrepresenting what Austrian economics is. Krugman thinks the recent financial crisis can test (and prove) the superiority of Keynes prescriptions for an ailing economy. Before we delve into the specifics, consider the alternatives Krugman proposes: classical economics (he considers Austrian among them) and […]
Fox News: Inconsistent on Obama’s Economics
The television in my household is often tuned into Fox News (almost never by my choosing). Through the various programs (especially The Five), I overhear constant complaints about President Obama’s handling of the economy. More often than not, I find the talking heads to be demonstrating flawed, inconsistent thinking in their complaints that are not […]
Why we need financial markets
“My true adversary in this battle,” he said “has no name, no face, no party… it is the world of finance.” Thus spoke new French President Francois Hollande while campaigning last month. Despite the seeming backwardness of such sentiments, it is no secret that many people actually do feel a degree of animosity toward the […]
Introducing Liberty Classroom!
With the introduction of Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom, you now have the opportunity to learn the history and economics that you never learned in school. Since the “intellectual battle for the free society is on,” Liberty Classroom‘s “goal is to equip as many ambassadors for liberty as possible with the knowledge that they need to […]
Sources (and Distortions) of Government Revenue
After my post on The Truth About Austerity and hearing some great feedback from Peter in the comments, I deemed it necessary to dedicate a post to explaining the basics of public finance. We at Hans try to make basic economics accessible to all readers, so I will aim to keep it simple and limit […]
Banks: The Student-Borrower’s Best Friend!
I made a statement in a recent op-ed published at Values and Capitalism that banks do student-borrowers a favor by allowing them to use money in the present pay it back in the future. Considering the nature of some of the feedback I received, I think it is worth exploring in more detail why this […]
The Truth About Austerity
Recently I have been frustrated by the controversy over whether Britain’s policy of austerity has led to a double dip recession in the UK. Progressive economists like Paul Krugman assert that a policy of austerity has been an utter failure, proving that government spending is needed to lift an economy out of malaise and put […]
How My Naïve Perception of the Economics Profession Eventually Changed
It was my senior year of high school at Trinity Christian High School. I was required to write a 20-30 page senior thesis throughout the year in order to graduate, and that thesis was required to outline 3 things: my personal religious beliefs, a defense/argument for a particular issue, and (most importantly) how my worldview […]