Matt Zwolinski and I have a friendly debate about several technical, foundational issues in Rand’s theory of rights: Can rights be based on egoism? What’s the connection between property rights and value creation? What counts as an improper initiation of force? Several other sub-issues about content and method arise along the way. In about 750 words each, […]
Zwolinski and Hicks on Rand and rights theory Read More »
I participated in a seminar on the Jones Act of 1920, with good presentations by Phil Magness, Woan Foong Wong, Ken Schoolland, Keli’i Akina, and others. The Jones Act requires that any cargo carried between two US ports be (a) carried only on US-built ships or barges that are (b) mostly manned by US citizens, and
The dead hand of the Jones Act of 1920 Read More »
About the following list of the top ten oil companies in the world, ask two questions: How many are government-owned and how many privately owned? and Of the privately owned, how many are highly regulated and how many operate in free markets? 1 Saudi Aramco 478.00 (evenue in year 2015) 2 Sinopec 455.499 3 China
The Biggest Oil Companies in the World Read More »
When I immigrated to the United States, the experience was not quite a nightmare but more like a series of bad dreams. I was from friendly Canada. I had a Ph.D. and a job offer from an American university. Yet the process—over several years—was a series of frustrations and indignities as I filled out dozens
The Limits of Open Immigration [Good Life series] Read More »
In my “Where are all those free-market economists who caused the financial crisis?”, I cited survey results showing that very few professional economists are deregulation advocates, and I cited data indicating an increase in regulation in the lead-up to the crisis. Here is Regdata’s more recent “Did Deregulation Cause the Financial Crisis? Examining a Common
Before the 2008 financial crisis: increasing or decreasing regulation? Read More »
[A discussion post.] President Trump’s now-serious proposal to eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities has elicited the first round of responses ranging from Philistine! to It’s about time! Both agencies were created in 1965 by President Lyndon Johnson, who said at the time: “it is necessary and
Trump’s Call to Eliminate Government Art Funding Read More »
Olympe de Gouges’s first-wave feminism and her The Declaration of the Rights of Woman (1791). The first two items: “1. Woman is born free and remains equal to man in rights. Social distinctions may be based only on common utility. 2. The purpose of all political association is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible
Olympe de Gouges’s 1791 declaration of women’s rights Read More »
Alt-Right philosopher Jason Reza Jorjani is taken on by hard-left philosophers at Jacobin magazine. My commentary article begins this way: Is a seismic change rumbling through Left-wing circles? In the hard-Left Jacobin magazine, two young philosophers bemoan their discovery that postmodern strategies have now been captured by the hateful and hated Alt-Right — and so in
Alt-Right versus Hard Left — Forcing a Return to the Enlightenment? Read More »