Nomadicoder

According to Andrew Olson, the problem is not the price of gasoline, but the value of the Dollar.
In 1980, in Portland, Oregon, I typically filled up, under these draconian conditions, for an average of $1.24 per gallon. Adjusted for inflation, this comes out to $3.18 today. (I filled up in Lodi, NJ, last weekend for […]

Friends at my church have been promoting microfinance as a means to pull the third world out of poverty. Until recently I was an advocate of microfinance, but Jeff Tucker of the Mises Institute changed my mind with his analytic response. In fact, he has written on this as early as 1999.
Today, Michael […]

I came across this in a posting about friend, Ed Stringham:
“… Democracies adopt bad policies because most people are irrationally committed to systematically mistaken economic (and other) beliefs, and politicians have to heed public opinion to get elected”
So much for bringing democracy to the rest of the world.

Technorati Tags: Economics, Philosophy, politics

From last week’s EconTalk podcast:
I do to improve my sense of well-being? New field of Positive Psychology points to gratitude, forgiveness, and optimism as actually making people happier.
An economic case for a Christian idea.
Technorati Tags: christian, Economics

In the link of my previous post, Stephen W. Carson references an article in USA Today.
There are people I knew who don’t comprehend the concept that if people consume less of a product, the price of that product tends to drop. One gentlemen, in particular, whom I shall call ‘D’, thought that price controls […]

Mises Economics Blog: Newsflash! Demand Curve Slopes Down!!
Imagine that. Gas prices go up, and people cut back on driving. Some of my more clueless friends think that the only solution to high gas prices is price control and windfall profits taxes. There’s nothing like cutting back on driving and carpooling to […]

Three or four years ago, I played hammered dulcimer for a Christmas Eve service at my former church. Some of the musicians, I later learned were hired professionals. One of them commented to me that if I were good enough I could make it big. I thought, why would I want to […]

A pastor friend asked me about a good starter book on economics from a classical liberal point of view. The first two are available on line thanks to the Liberty Fund’s Online Library of Liberty and their Library of Economics and Liberty.

Frederic Bastiat: What is Seen and What Is Not Seen
Frederic Bastiat: The Law, […]

I arrived in Grand Rapids last night, a day early. This was because Acton wanted us to be at the Airport by 3:00pm. The earliest flight got in at 8:30pm, hence the early arrival. When I got in, I posted the entries I wrote in transit, caught the latest podcasts, and went […]