Prices are what organize the market economy, which means prices are a crucial form of communication that governments should never, ever meddle with. Too bad Milton Friedman’s monetarism continues to shrink the discussion of what’s 3rd grade (money), but at the same time thank goodness the only closed economy is the world economy such that the Fed […]
Paul Volcker Never Was Because Monetarism Never Will Be Read More »
When Facebook purchased Instagram for $1 billion in 2012, the deal wasn’t seen as obvious or a slam dunk… for Facebook. Which is a statement of the obvious, one abundantly proven by modern estimates that place Instagram’s standalone value at something north of $100 billion. Which brings us to another statement of the obvious,
A Weak Market for ‘Unicorns’ Muscularly Supports Meta Over the FTC Read More »
Gold and the foot are constants. You don’t adjust value and height against them, rather you adjust the value of everything else and length of everything else in terms of gold and the foot. Consider North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. He is 5’7”. It’s easy to imagine him redefining the foot as 6
There’s No Such Thing As ‘Adjusting’ Gold Price To ‘Inflation’ Read More »
Before investor Bill Ackman requested from President Trump a pause on his tariffs, he perhaps reasonably observed that Trump deserved the benefit of the doubt, that he’s often forged another path to right to the surprise of his critics, and that investors should support him. Pundits who follow Ackman, including New Criterion editor Roger Kimball, agreed with Ackman
Thanks to Markets, We Don’t Need ‘Wait-and-See’ With Trump Tariffs Read More »
History will show that as traditional test scores meant to gauge in-class learning fell in the U.S., so rose the economic prospects of that same U.S. Pundits fail to see this because they view education as some kind of other. It’s not. For background, stop and think about the biggest and best U.S. businesses in
Falling Test Scores Are a Bullish Market Signal of a Better Future Read More »
A gold standard would do wonders for economic growth, but would almost certainly not limit the growth of our federal government. The view that it would insults markets at least three times, but certainly many more. Implicit in the notion that a gold-defined dollar would bring about fiscal discipline is the odd view suggesting
A Gold Standard Is Great, But It Doesn’t Force Fiscal Discipline Read More »
“The world is being swamped with Chinese goods, and the United States, Europe and Japan are right to worry about it.” Those are the opening words of a recent Washington Post editorial about Chinese production. The bet here is that the writers of the editorial could be persuaded to rethink their pessimism. Production is always bullish, by definition.
Contra the Washington Post, Exports Are a Bullish Sign of Imports Read More »
Andy Kessler writes in his latest Wall Street Journal column that the U.S. “is strong precisely because we don’t all think the same way. New ideas come from new ways of thinking.” Kessler puts it so well. We individuals generally see the present and future very differently, and it’s this very division praised by Kessler that powers
Freedom Is the Only Way to Beat Authoritarianism Read More »
If you look at the market prices of consumer goods you’ll much more often than not be blinded to inflation’s truth. To which more than a few readers will reply that prices are precisely the way to divine inflation. Figure that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) is “the price of a weighted average market
Market Prices Are A Very Unreliable Way To Detect Inflation Read More »
Banks are in the business of paying interest on deposits so that they can lend out the funds deposited with them at a higher rate of interest. Some will respond that the latter is a statement of the obvious, but sometimes the obvious requires stating. In particular it requires stating as banks are accused
Banks Aren’t Interested In Politics, But Politicians Are Interested In Banks Read More »
