Economics
The idea of "collapse", social and financial, comes with an incredible array of hypothetical consequences ranging from public dissent and martial law, to the complete disintegration of infrastructure and the devolution of mankind into a swarm of mindless arm-chewing cannibals. In an age of television nirvana and cinema overload, I ...read more
Cracks in the Foundation
Aug 6th, 2012 | By Dan Denning | Category: Economics, Featured
Step away from watching the markets hour by hour and eventually you'll notice something. What you'll notice is that most of the news is garbage. Websites and cable news channels need a constant news flow to justify movements in stock prices. But most of the time there is no connection ...read more
Tiffany’s and the Problem of Security
Aug 3rd, 2012 | By Jeffrey Tucker | Category: Economics, Featured, Politics
After Sept. 11, the American system of government became crazy obsessed with security. The implementation has not only been brutal and contrary to human liberty; it has completely lacked creativity. Instead of real security, we get what's called "security theater," and at the expense of the customer, who feels the ...read more
The Monetization of Everything
Jul 30th, 2012 | By Gary North | Category: Economics, Featured, Macro Economics
What the Federal Reserve System can do and what it will do are two different things.
The Federal Reserve System can monetize anything. It can create digital money and buy any asset it chooses to buy. There are no legal restrictions on what it is allowed to monetize.
If it were to ...read more
The Triumph of Politics
Jul 27th, 2012 | By Detlev Schlichter | Category: Economics, Featured, Politics
On August 15, 1971, President Richard Nixon declared that the United States would no longer honour its promise to exchange US dollars held by foreign central banks for gold at a fixed price of $35 an ounce. The innocuous term 'Nixon closed the gold window' that is now widely used ...read more
Business Begging for Life
Jul 26th, 2012 | By Jeffrey Tucker | Category: Economics, Featured, Politics
Even in this seemingly permanent recession, government is intensifying its regulation, taxation and harassment of regular business people. Business pages are filling up with pleas to government from real-life entrepreneurs. All these people are saying is give freedom a chance.
An example is Seth Gordon, the co-founder and "TeaEO" of Honest ...read more
U.S. Poverty: It’s Spreading
Jul 25th, 2012 | By Mac Slavo | Category: Economics, Featured
It's bad out there. Really bad.
As world leaders finally begin to admit that we are smack dab in the middle of another Great Depression and the economy stands at the cusp of another earth-shaking collapse of the financial system, the US census reports that nearly 100 million Americans are now ...read more
Separating the Banking Wheat from the Chaff
Jul 18th, 2012 | By Douglas French | Category: Economics, Featured
No one cares when, each Friday, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) closes a small bank here and there. The local paper runs an item, but otherwise bank closures are non-events. The regulators from the FDIC, state banking authorities, along with the local police, lock the doors of the retail ...read more
Expat, Meet Obamacare
Jul 17th, 2012 | By Jim Karger | Category: Economics, Featured, Politics
My wife and I had dinner last night at a small Asian-fusion restaurant here in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico with two lawyer friends visiting from the United States. One sat down and immediately began our evening's conversation with a story.
"You won't believe this," he said, holding up his thumb, ...read more
The Day Your Life Fell Apart
Jul 12th, 2012 | By Jeffrey Tucker | Category: Economics, Featured, Politics
People tell me that I get overly worked up about small government regulations. But small matters. The building of civilization is revealed in small steps, tiny, bit-by-bit improvements in the things we have and do. In the same way, seemingly small government regulations can cause a reversal of the magnificent ...read more

