In both the United States and Britain the 1980s were a decade of bold economic reform and revival that led to a generation of increasing (if overstated) prosperity. Regrettably, most of the reforms that changed the sluggish 1970s into the economically dynamic 1980s have since been reversed. Reversal of much of the increase in prosperity […]

Harlow H. Curtice, President of General Motors, was “Time” magazine’s “Man of the Year” in 1955, the first businessman to receive that honor since Walter Chrysler in 1928, and the last until Ted Turner in 1991. Curtice presided over a U.S. economy that provided rapidly increasing living standards every year to the American people. One […]

The repeated and unconvincing assertions by General Motors Chief Executive Officer Robert Wagoner that the company is not going bankrupt have caused observers to bemoan the excessive costs of GM’s pension obligations or the evils of outsourcing, or to welcome the inevitable and welcome decline in U.S. manufacturing in a high-tech future. Would a GM […]

The Federal Reserve Board announced Thursday that from March 23, 2006 the Fed will cease publishing M3 money supply statistics. One thus wonders whether the U.S. political class has finally decided to hide economic failure by means of fraudulent accounting. Each new statistic would report stellar growth, with moderate inflation, increasing living standards and a […]

Successive meetings on oil at the American Enterprise Institute Wednesday and on the world’s monetary system at the Cato Institute Thursday brought the current problems with the world economy sharply into focus. There’s far too much money currently sloshing around the world, and not nearly enough oil. The combination of the two will make for […]

The “advance” estimate of third quarter Gross Domestic Product growth, released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis Friday, at 3.8 percent, was greeted by the stock market with a huge sigh of relief. It appeared to vindicate the view of market bulls and the George W. Bush administration that the U.S. economy remained in fine […]

President George W. Bush’s selection of his personal lawyer Harriet Miers for the Supreme Court has enthralled the blogosphere for three weeks, peeling off much of Bush’s support from the right. Yet Bush will soon make a selection with even more potential for good or ill in everybody’s lives: that of a successor to Fed […]

President George W. Bush’s Tax Advisory Commission, due to issue a preliminary report November 1, was reported Wednesday to be considering capping the home mortgage interest deduction at $300,000 principal amount, capping corporate tax deductions for employee healthcare premiums at $11,000 and eliminating the Alternative Minimum Tax. These proposals and the furore they aroused bring […]

Since 2002, indeed to some extent since 1995, the U.S. economy has been managed on Kamikaze principles. Long term goals and traditional prudential controls have been sacrificed in order to keep the stock and housing bubbles inflated. In this traditionally tricky month of October, it appears that the kamikaze approach to economics may no longer […]

Gordon Hanson, presenting his new book “Why Does Immigration Divide America” at the Institute for International Economics Thursday, referred to a restrictionist policy on illegal immigrants as “politically impossible.” The Wall Street Journal Friday made the same reference in relation to Congress potentially shutting down Fannie Mae’s economy-threatening derivatives operation. Why are apparently plausible policies […]