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Writing by John Tamny and Parkview contributors, from the latest commentary to the collected archive.
994 essays · Newest first
Clear filtersIn the 1860s the first transcontinental cable was laid on the ocean floor. While it miraculously connected North America with Europe, communication via the connection was only affordable to the…
Bitcoin in its present, high-profile form cannot be money. About the previous assertion, it should in no way be taken as a knock on crypto, or private money more broadly. Evidence supporting the…
Jack Ryan is passionate about expanding access to housing. Ryan’s passion makes him ideal as HUD secretary for the incoming Trump administration. To which some will respond that what Ryan believes in…
It’s always amusing to read about businesses said to possess so-called “monopoly” power in the U.S., or much more disturbingly, about accusations of “monopoly” power from the ankle biters inside the…
Cato Institute co-founder Ed Crane has long said in print, on television and in person that a focus on economic growth misses the point. Paraphrasing Crane, if the people are free they’ll have all…
A recent front page story in the Wall Street Journal told the story of a courageous entrepreneur who impressively got in the proverbial door with Costco. She had what Journal reporter Ruth Simon…
Every so often it’s useful to quote arguably the most important passage from Wall Street Journal reporter Craig Karmin’s 2008 book, Biography of the Dollar. Karmin noted that prior to 1971, there…
Warren Buffett has famously said that “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and 5 minutes to ruin it.” Buffett’s wise words rate prominent mention in light of a disturbing pattern of corporate…
Promoting his new book over the summer, economist Ruchir Sharma managed to get one of its main themes splashed all over the media: “When the price of borrowing money is zero, the price of everything…
“I saw a little piano in the room and I closed the door. Something said to me, ‘Idiot, go back in that room!’ I went back in the room and touched the piano…and every drop of blood in my body said,…
“Get out of the car! Get the f**k out of my car.” That’s a paraphrase of the words of the recently passed, and incomparably GREAT Bernie Marcus. Marcus, along with Arthur Blank and Ken Langone,…
Flipping through the channels on election night, I was reminded of the Dallas Cowboys winning their second straight Super Bowl in 1994. A friend of mine who truly loathed the Cowboys (the Oilers were…
Who manages the Yankees? Or the Dodgers? By the conclusion of the 1977 World Series, managers Tommy Lasorda (Dodgers) and Billy Martin (Yankees) were household names. So were the players. It’s easy…
“I’m way too smart for Barack Obama, and I was way too smart for George W. Bush.” Those were the words of Houston businessman Ron Farmer in February of 2009. Keep the time when Farmer said what he…
Whether it’s actual inflation, or the kind of “inflation” that only economists and their media enablers tend to imagine it to be, a consensus invariably emerges that the Federal Reserve must “raise…
Back in the 1980s and 1990s, and likely before that, the University of Southern California (USC) had the reputation of a “safety school.” The biggest challenge to what some referred to as the…
In a recent article published in the Wall Street Journal, it was reported that credit-card giant Visa offered Costco a rather princely, anti-competitive deal in 2014. At least that’s the impression…
Humans don’t take wealth, they create it. And they create it by virtue of dividing up work with other humans and machines. It’s called specialization, and it’s the root of productivity. These…
It was recently revealed that lefty economist Robert Reich is not – gasp – an economist. It turns out he’s just a left-wing lawyer. The joke is on those who think Reich’s lack of a PhD is the source…
“Do you honestly think you’re going to replace this?” The previous question should be printed and framed in poster-sized fashion at the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) antitrust trust division. The…
Gold is referred to as a constant for good reason. It’s price doesn’t move. What moves are the currencies in which it’s priced. Which is a reminder that when the price of gold in dollars declines,…
Honore de Balzac observed in seemingly acidic fashion that “Behind every great fortune there is a crime.” Eventually FDR latched onto Balzac’s nonsensical notion, and now it seems to be gaining…
Credit cards are used by billions of consumers at billions of businesses precisely because buyer and seller alike gain so much from their existence. Consumers can purchase what they want when they…
“If you want to know what raising a family might look like under a Kamala Harris presidency, look to this Rust Belt city.” Those are the words of Washington Post economics columnist Catherine…
