The schizophrenia of progressive economic thought was on full display last week in the wake of some bad economic news. On the one hand, progressives believe the U.S. economy is so fragile that even the mere threat of cuts in government spending would be disastrous. On the other hand, they believe this same economy is so resilient that billions upon billions of dollars in regulatory costs have no effect on growth at all.
1:12 PM 11/21/2012
As if the “fiscal cliff” were not enough, banks of all sizes — and in turn the consumers and businesses that rely on their credit — also face the “Basel cliff.”
3:06 PM 08/09/2012
Matthew Boyle’s groundbreaking reports this week in The Daily Caller provide further confirmation that in the Obama auto bailouts, all jobs were not created equal. The administration moved heaven and earth to save the jobs and generous benefits of General Motors and Chrysler workers who belonged to the United Auto Workers, ripping up the contracts of bondholders and secured creditors --- including middle-class retirees and teachers and police officers in state pension plans --- to give the UAW an enlarged stake in the new companies. “As a result,” notes Amy Payne of The Heritage Foundation, “even after the reorganization, GM still has higher labor costs ($56 an hour) than any of its foreign-based competitors.”
5:19 PM 05/18/2012
Today, Facebook finally went public. Its initial public offering (IPO) is the capstone of its amazing ascent, which changed the way the world communicates.
3:33 PM 01/02/2012
By filing a civil fraud suit in mid-December against former executives of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) took an action that has benefits far beyond bringing justice for investors. Among other things, it ruined the holidays of some of the nation’s most prominent liberal commentators by exposing the flaws of their narrative blaming the “unfettered free market” for the housing meltdown.
10:43 AM 05/03/2011
On the eve of the royal wedding, The Wall Street Journal published an op-ed I wrote celebrating the entrepreneurship of Kate Middleton’s parents and pointing to their good fortune in business as an example of how economic life in Britain has improved— largely due to former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s reforms — since Charles and Diana’s wedding in 1981. Similar points about increased British prosperity were made by the London think tank Centre for Policy Studies.
4:36 PM 02/04/2011
Although the U.S. Senate voted along partisan lines Wednesday to defeat repeal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act — also known as Obamacare — it overwhelmingly on the same day voted to repeal one of the provisions that has proven most burdensome to entrepreneurs: the mandate for business to file IRS 1099 reports on any purchase over $600.
1:28 PM 05/13/2010
Give Dick Durbin some credit for his chutzpah. It’s not every lawmaker who, in proposing an amendment to a financial reform bill ostensibly aimed at targeting “fat cats,” would admit that the inspiration for his measure was a Fortune 500 CEO.
12:00 AM 05/07/2010
General Motors’ false advertising that it has paid back its bailout money “in full” has prompted harsh criticism. Yesterday, Competitive Enterprise Institute Attorneys Hans Bader and Sam Kazman filed a complaint asking the Federal Trade Commission to investigate these claims, noting “GM has only repaid a fraction of those funds—barely ten percent, and “moreover, GM apparently repaid its loan by using other federal funds [emphasis in original]”
12:00 AM 04/07/2010
In the continuing debate over the recently signed health care bill, the flash point is the individual mandate—the requirement that nearly all American adults purchase what the federal government determines is an adequate amount of personal health insurance. Even though this aspect of the bill had received widespread support in the business community and has been supported in the past by some Republicans, many Americans still see such a sweeping mandate as a bridge too far.
12:00 AM 02/02/2010
In news accounts about fights over new regulation, the story is almost always the same. The media portray the drama as that of well-intentioned experts wanting more regulation to protect the public good versus the business lobby ferociously opposed to the imposition of these new rules.
