Daily Articles

Political Correctness and the Closed Society

by Richard M. Ebeling June 1, 1992

In February 1992, the Center for Constructive Alternatives of Hillsdale College in Michigan organized a five-day conference on "Thought Police on Campus: Is Academic Freedom in Danger?" Among the speakers invited to participate as opponents of political correctness in academia were Charles Sykes (author of Profscam and The Hollow Men,) Shelby Steele (author of The Content ...

A Free Market for Health Care

by Sheldon Richman June 1, 1992

Concerned about rising costs the number of Americans without medical insurance, nearly everyone is these days about a day goes by without a presidential or a magazine calling for something drastic to be done. Each advocate maintains that his plan will bring skyrocketing costs under control, make health care accessible to low-income people, and bring health insurance within the ...

Hepburn v. Griswold

by Jacob G. Hornberger June 1, 1992

In 1860, Susan P. Hepburn executed a promissory note in which she expressly promised to repay a loan of one thousand dollars. When the note came due in 1862, Hepburn tendered to Henry A. Griswold, the owner of the note, United States governmental notes totaling the amount of the debt. Griswold refused the tender and sued Hepburn for his ...

Book Review: The Flight from Truth

by Richard M. Ebeling June 1, 1992

The Flight from Truth: The Reign of Deceit in the Age of Information by Jean-Francois Revel (New York: Random House, 1991); 408 pages; $25. When Jean-Francois Revel published How Democracies Perish in the early 1980s, he wanted to deliver a ...

Playing Monopoly in the Real World

by Jacob G. Hornberger May 1, 1992

There are three major monopolies in the United States that have plagued the American people throughout most of this century. Yet despite their professed opposition to monopolies, the American people simply cannot bring themselves to end them. But end them we must — for they are among the most tyrannical and destructive aspects of the American welfare-state, regulated-economy way ...

Quick Fixes and Economic Fallacies

by Richard M. Ebeling May 1, 1992

The famous English economist Alfred Marshall is reported to have once remarked that "students of social science must fear popular approval; evil is with them when all men speak well of them. If there is any set of opinions by the advocacy of which a newspaper can increase its sales, then the student . . . is bound to ...

Monopoly

by Dominick T. Armentano May 1, 1992

I have been teaching economics at the university level for twenty-five years. Easily the most often-asked questions relate to monopolies. The questions are often put in the following form: "In an economy free of governmental regulation, wouldn't a firm or group of firms obtain a monopoly over some vital resource or ...

The Phantom Called “Monopoly”

by Hans Sennholz May 1, 1992

In their denunciation of capitalism the socialists use some frightful phantoms. The oldest and perhaps the most effective one is the notion that monopolistic concentration of business inheres permanently and inseparably in capitalism. They depict in vivid colors the horrors of monopolistic capitalism and then conclude that a free ...

Book Review: Anti-Americanism

by Richard M. Ebeling May 1, 1992

Anti-Americanism: Critiques at Home and Abroad, 1965-1990 by Paul Hollander (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992); 515 pages; $35. In 1981, Professor Paul Hollander published Political Pilgrims: Travels of Western Intellectuals to the Soviet Union, China and Cuba. He explained and critically evaluated the appeal that socialist countries have had ...

Book Review – Constitutional Economics

by Richard M. Ebeling April 27, 1992

Constitutional Economics by James M. Buchanan (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Basil Blackwell, 1991); 137 pages; $29.95 What are the reasons behind the growth of government in the 20th century? And why has it been so difficult to diminish the size of government even when many in society may have come to the conclusion ...

Seeking Security in a Government-Guaranteed World

by Jacob G. Hornberger April 1, 1992

Throughout history, people have surrendered their liberties to government in the hope of attaining a sense of security. The American people in this century proved to be no different. Our ancestors had established a way of life in which there was no income taxation, welfare, or economic regulation — a ...

If Liberty Mattered … A Presidential Candidate’s Press Conference

by Richard M. Ebeling April 1, 1992

Election years are meant to be momentous events in the life of a nation. The electorate are given the opportunity to determine the political course of the country. And every four years, the electoral process includes the election of the president has come to symbolize the mood of the country — a statement by the people on the political ...