President Joe Biden and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.) are blaming corporate America for "shrinkflation," where a company charges the same amount for a product while reducing the product's size or quantity. Recently, Senator Bob Casey (D–Pa.) introduced the Shrinkflation Prevention Act, which declares shrinkflation a deceptive business practice and would forbid companies to engage in it.Casey, Biden, Warren, and other like-minded politicians maintain that the underlying cause of shrinkflation is "greed." But, as Andrew Heaton explains, greed is pretty much constant across industries and time periods. Shrinkflation is just a passive-aggressive form of inflation, which we are struggling with largely due to government fiscal policy.
Thousands of jobs have already been eliminated by California's law to raise the minimum wage to $20 for restaurant workers, which goes into effect April 1.
"Argentine president Javier Milei... has consolidated eighteen government ministries into nine... and introduced a 350‐page package of economic reforms that would make Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek smile." - Michael Chapman, Cato InstituteIt was only episode 73, when I thought it was going to be too difficult for Javier Milei to actually downsize government spending.Now, it's episode 80 and we already have good news to report from Argentina! There are dramatic cuts.On top of that, the first economic miracle has arrived, thanks to deregulation.We break it down with all of the juicy details in an episode we're calling "Javier Milei Early Report Card"...
Did nations get rich on the backs of other nations? Did the West get rich from imperialism? Noah Smith says no. But why not? If you can steal stuff, isn't that better than having to make it yourself? Listen as Noah Smith and EconTalk's Russ Roberts discuss the impact of imperialism and industrialization on growth and wealth. Smith argues that understanding plunder and where wealth comes from is more than an exercise in economic history--it matters for today's world, too.
If we care about the future of the economy, then we have to pay close attention to the policies that shape it.We are currently living in an age of extreme -- and in certain cases, unprecedented -- levels of monetary and fiscal policy.Is that wise? Or should market forces be allowed to play out more & free us from the constant intervention of the central planners?To explore this, we welcome economist Dr Arthur Laffer. Dr Laffer was the first to hold the title of Chief Economist at the Office of Management and Budget in the early 1970s. He then later served as a member of President Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board. He's perhaps best known for developing the Laffer curve, a model for determining the optimal balance between tax revenues and economic growth.
Good intentions, bad results.Watch the whole series here: #^https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oztz17JUpr0&list=PLBuns9Evn1w9XhnH7vVh_7C65wJbaBECK&index=1&t=0sPar...
welcome to the “subsidize demand and arrest anyone who tries to take advantage of the price caps” stage of the greendemic of darkness sweeping the globe as deeply unserious people propose deeply unserious “solutions” to entirely avoidable problems of their own making.
Economics is the study of human action—the choices people make in a world of scarcity. Scarcity means that people have unlimited wants but we live in a world of limited resources. Because of this fact people have to make choices, and choices imply trade-offs. The choices people make are influenced by the incentives they face and those incentives are shaped by the institutions—rules of the game—under which people live and interact with others.In this essay, I will explain eight ideas and give examples of the economic way of thinking.