New York Times Seeks Higher Taxes on the “Rich” as Prelude to Higher Taxes on...
In a very predictable editorial this morning, the New York Times pontificated in favor of higher taxes. Compared to Paul Krugman’s rant earlier in the week, which featured the laughable assertion that...
View ArticleOverwhelming Evidence for Less Government Spending
Alberto Alesina of Harvard’s economics department summarizes some of his research in a column for today’s Wall Street Journal. He and a colleague looked at fiscal policy changes in developed nations...
View ArticleHere’s How to Balance the Budget
Our fiscal policy goal should be smaller government, but here’s a video for folks who think that balancing the budget should be the main objective. The main message is that restraining the growth of...
View ArticleWould You Trade Higher Taxes for Much Lower Spending and Less Red Tape?
I hate taxes more than anyone, but other policies matter as well, so if I had the choice of replacing current government policies with the ones that existed at the end of the Clinton years, I would...
View ArticleWhere are the ’60s Hippies Now that They’re Needed to Fight Keynesianism?
Keynesian economic theory is the social-science version of a perpetual motion machine. It assumes that you can increase your prosperity by taking money out of your left pocket and putting it in your...
View ArticleDo We Have a Problem of Too Much Spending or Too Little Revenue?
Here’s a chart from Veronique de Rugy’s new article in The American. Amazing how the problem becomes obvious when you look at real numbers and don’t get trapped into using “baseline” math (as I explain...
View ArticleCo-Chairmen of Obama’s Fiscal Commission Unveil Real Tax Increases and Fake...
I have many pet peeves, but one that causes me endless frustration is the Washington “spending cut” scam. This happens when politicians increase spending, but claim that they’re cutting spending...
View ArticleHow’s that Stimulus Working, Mr. President?
The Bureau of Labor Statistics announced this morning that the unemployment rate jumped to 9.8 percent last month. As you can see from the chart, the White House claimed that if we enacted the...
View ArticleEven Studies from the European Central Bank Show Spending Restraint Is Key to...
I’m not a big fan of central banks, and I definitely don’t like multilateral bureaucracies, so I almost feel guilty about publicizing two recent studies published by the European Central Bank. But when...
View ArticleTo Fix the Budget, Bring Back Reagan…or Even Clinton
President Obama unveiled his fiscal year 2012 budget today, and there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that there’s no major initiative such as the so-called stimulus scheme or the...
View ArticleDeconstructing the Spending Side of Obama’s Proposed FY2012 Budget
President Obama’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2012 has been released and there is lots of rhetoric in Washington about “budget cuts.” At first glance, this seems warranted. According to the...
View ArticleBarack Obama and Harry Reid Are AWOL in the Fight for Fiscal Responsibility
In the past 10 years, the burden of federal spending has skyrocketed, more than doubling from$1.86 trillion in 2001 to an estimated $3.82 this year. President Bush deserves a lot of the blame thanks to...
View ArticleWashington’s Make-Believe Spending Cuts
The recent agreement between Obama and Boehner supposedly cuts spending by $38 billion. I’ve already explained that this number is disappointingly small and noted that the effect on spending for the...
View ArticleNotwithstanding Media Coverage of Black Friday, Consumer Spending Does Not...
By fighting for freedom in Washington, I’ve condemned myself to a life of frustration and aggravation. One of my many pet peeves is that so many people in DC believe that economic growth depends on...
View ArticleNew Congressional Budget Office Numbers Once Again Show that Modest Spending...
Back in 2010, I crunched the numbers from the Congressional Budget Office and reported that the budget could be balanced in just 10 years if politicians exercised a modicum of fiscal discipline and...
View ArticlePenile Moments in Government Waste
It’s not often that I get to use the word “penis” on a public policy blog. But with my juvenile sense of humor, I exploit such opportunities whenever they arise. I wrote about an unfortunate guy who...
View ArticleAccording to Obama’s Budget, Burden of Federal Spending Will Be $2 Trillion...
President Obama’s budget proposal was unveiled today, generating all sorts of conflicting statements from both parties. Some of the assertions wrongly focus on red ink rather than the size of...
View ArticleNew Budget from Republican Study Committee Reduces Burden of Government to...
A couple of weeks ago, I offered some guarded praise for Paul Ryan’s budget, pointing out that it satisfies the most important requirement of fiscal policy by restraining spending – to an average of...
View ArticleBurden of Government Spending Will Be $2 Trillion Higher in 2023 According to...
If you include all the appendices, there are thousands of pages in the President’s new budget. But the first thing I do every year is find the table showing how fast the burden of government spending...
View ArticleBalanced Budget Requirements Don’t Work as Well as Spending Limits
When I first came to Washington back in the 1980s, there was near-universal support and enthusiasm for a balanced budget amendment among advocates of limited government. The support is still there, I’m...
View ArticleIt’s Time for 2016 Candidates to Unveil Plans to Restrain Spending
I’m pleasantly surprised by the tax plans proposed by Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Jeb Bush, and Donald Trump. In varying ways, all these candidate have put forth relatively detailed proposals that address...
View ArticleEven the OECD Now Admits Spending Caps Are the only Effective Way of...
I’m not a big fan of the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. That international bureaucracy is controlled by high-tax nations that want to export bad policy to the rest...
View ArticleA Big Fiscal Victory: Constitutional Spending Caps for Brazil!
The good thing about being a libertarian (above and beyond respecting the rights and liberties of other people) is that you can always say “I told you so” when government intervention leads to bad...
View ArticleThe (Spending) Nightmare Before Christmas
Yesterday’s column about “the tax nightmare before Christmas” was based on my fear that politicians will try to impose a value-added tax at some point in the not-too-distant future. Today’s column is...
View ArticleSpending and Tax Limits in (the Country of) Georgia
I wrote two days ago about how the country of Georgia has achieved impressive economic performance thanks to major reforms to reduce the size and scope of government. Indeed, Georgia jumped from #56 to...
View ArticleIn One Chart, Everything You Need to Know about America’s Long-Run Fiscal...
I wrote yesterday about the continuing success of Switzerland’s spending cap. Before voters changed the Swiss constitution, overall expenditures were growing by an average of 4.6 percent annually. Ever...
View ArticleTrump’s Greek-Style Budget Deal
I point out in this interview that the 2011 Budget Control Act (BCA) was the only big victory for taxpayers this century. It imposed spending caps on discretionary spending and led to a sequester in...
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Everything You Need to Know about Fixing the Budget Mess in Washington
The 21st century has been bad news for proponents of limited government. Bush was a big spender, Obama was a big spender, Trump was a big spender, and now Biden also wants to buy votes with other...
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Bigger Government Will Reduce Living Standards According to New CBO Research
I’ve been warning that the United States should not copy Europe’s fiscal policy, largely because living standards are significantly lower in nations with large welfare states. That’s true if you look...
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Understanding Keynesian Economics
While speaking last week at the Acton Institute in Michigan, I responded to a question about the perpetual motion machine of Keynesian economics. For purposes of today’s column, let’s try to understand...
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