Source: David Friedman’s Substack
by David Friedman

“Henry George was a prominent 19th century American economist, chiefly remembered today for the single tax, the idea that government ought to be funded by taxing away all income from the site value of land with any excess distributed to the population. His modern followers are a faction, I think the most intellectually coherent faction, among left libertarians, libertarians who for the most part share the economic and political beliefs of other libertarians but identify more with the left than the right in modern-day America. Some offer libertarian arguments for some form of income transfer, in the Georgist case funded by a tax on the site value of land.” (04/29/24)

https://daviddfriedman.substack.com/p/georgist-thoughts

Source: Reason
by CJ Ciaramella

“If it seems strange that something as anachronistic and exquisitely dorky as D&D is popular again, consider that those qualities may be exactly why people are drawn to it. The Atlantic recently reported that Americans are suffering a ‘kind of ritual recession, with fewer community-based routines’ and face-to-face meetups. It’s perhaps not surprising that D&D has become a redoubt for old-fashioned, goofy fun in our digital age. But there’s another reason D&D has weathered 50 years of critical successes and failures: It radically empowered its fans to create their own adventures and games, keeping the tabletop gaming hobby alive even when its flagship was floundering. The 50-year history of D&D is an entrepreneurial success story, yes, but it’s also a story of the advantages of an open-source, loose approach to intellectual property, and the disadvantages of being miserly with it.” (for publication 05/24)

https://reason.com/2024/04/29/50-years-of-dd-you-cant-copyright-fun/

Source: Philadelphia Inquirer
by Jennifer Stefano

“If you’ve been struggling to pay your heating bill, priced out of buying a home, or often find yourself making the decision between filling up your gas tank or feeding your family, President Joe Biden has a message for you: The economy is doing great. ‘America has the best economy in the world,’ Biden bragged this month. Of course, it does. America has been the world’s leading superpower since about 1898, when William McKinley was president. That’s hardly the point. Since taking office in January 2021, Biden has overseen an economy that is causing pain, not prosperity, for millions of Americans.” (04/29/24)

https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/biden-economy-inflation-elections-prices-20240429.html

Source: American Institute for Economic Research
by Kenneth W Costello

“Many, if not most, mainstream economists, both conservative and liberal, support a carbon tax. As economist Alan Blinder recently remarked, ‘It’s only a very slight exaggeration to say that all economists favor a carbon tax to mitigate climate change.’ But I argue below their position seems to overlook real-world politics, bureaucratic incentives, and the ‘pretense of knowledge.’ Advocates of a carbon tax seem to fall victim to what Ronald Coase labeled ‘blackboard economics.’ The benefits from such a tax may, therefore, be far less than promised by blackboard economics, and than advocates are claiming. In fact, the benefits can be negative, given what I regard as ‘guesstimates’ (highly uncertain metrics) that policymakers rely on to represent the damage from carbon.” (04/29/24)

https://www.aier.org/article/economists-advocacy-for-a-carbon-tax-is-misguided/