Stephen Hicks

Blamestorming and “Deregulation caused the financial crisis” [Good Life series]

1 Comment / Economics, Politics, The Good Life /

You’ve heard the claim: “Deregulation caused the crisis.” In the years leading up to 2008, the story goes, bad economists convinced bad politicians to deregulate the money/banking/finance sector of the economy, and bad capitalists then enjoyed an orgy of greed that caused the system to go haywire. Nobel-Prize-winners Joseph Stiglitz and Paul Krugman have signed […]

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Martín Krause’s index of economic and political institutional quality

Leave a Comment / Economics, Politics /

Martín Krause is Professor of Economics and the University of Buenos Aires and a specialist in law and economics and institutional economics. With Professor Krause’s permission, here is the 2015 edition of “INSTITUTIONAL QUALITY 2015” [pdf], which ranks 193 countries in three categories: Institutional Quality, Political Institutions, Market Institutions. For those interested in the performance

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Entrepreneurship and Values — seven short lectures

Leave a Comment / Business Ethics, Entrepreneurship, Politics /

CEE’s Entrepreneurship and Values series includes seven 15-20-minute lectures on foundational issues in entrepreneurship. 1. What Is Entrepreneurship? 2. Unleash Your Inner Company 3. Management and Entrepreneurship 4. What Makes Entrepreneurs Tick? 5. Entrepreneurship and Virtue Ethics 6. Entrepreneurship and Liberty 7. Entrepreneurship and Public Policy The lecturers are all entrepreneurs or university professors —

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Does Money Buy Elections? When Billionaires Court Voters [Good Life series]

Leave a Comment / Politics, The Good Life /

Another election looms, and the question on everyone’s mind is: Will the big donors get their money’s worth? Cynicism about money in politics is a healthy response to our long history of cronyism. When $700 billion in bailout funds were distributed during the 2008 crisis, politically-connected financial institutions such as Goldman Sachs received the lion’s

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Comparando el desempeño económico de América del Norte y América Latina [Spanish translation]

2 Comments / Economics, Español, Philosophy /

Por Stephen Hicks [This is a Spanish translation of “Comparing North and Latin American Economic Performance”, originally published in English at EveryJoe and in Portuguese at Libertarianismo.] Todos queremos que la gente logre vivir en forma adecuada, especialmente las personas pobres que están luchando por ello. Y si somos ambiciosos, queremos además que la gente pueda vivir

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