In my view, there are no a priori truths anywhere in the universe. But here I want to ask: Is the Law of Diminishing Utility even true? Returns diminish in many cases — but not all — and if diminishing returns is not universal, it can’t be a “law.”
Is the law of diminishing marginal utility true? Read More »
Troubles mounting in Argentina due to a government plagued by corruption scandals and heavy-handed, dysfunctional economic intervention and controls.
Do cry for me, Argentina Read More »
An instructive trio of essays by economists at Cato Unbound about Austrian economics’ reputation — especially Mises’s praxeological version — for being strongly a priori rationalist: Is Austrian economics anti-empiricist? Steve Horwitz says no. Bryan Caplan says yes. George Selgin also says yes. To Selgin’s series of quotations from Mises, I’d add this one from
Are Austrian economists anti-empirical? Read More »
I was struck by this philosophical economist’s connecting the Aristotelian solution to the so-called naturalistic fallacy to the question of the value of money. “This approach hints at the fact that a key element in this work is the treatment given to questions surrounding the ‘naturalistic fallacy.’ The basic reasoning here is that in regard
Zelmanovitz on philosophy of money Read More »
Over the years I’ve enjoyed and learned from many of Carlin Romano’s articles in The Chronicle of Higher Education. He can do good philosophical reporting. So I picked up America the Philosophical, and I was disappointed. Romano’s thesis is that the United States is a nation of vigorous philosophical activity and — contrary to the
Carlin Romano’s America the Philosophical Read More »
Two economists channel Miss Manners and Robert’s Rules of Order — or why good time-management manners have practical value. Mike Munger on lateness and punctuality. (I need to get me a terrifying assistant.) And Alex Tabarrok on the economics of punctuality.
Munger and Tabarrok on lateness and punctuality Read More »
Jumping into the debate about “bleeding-heart libertarianism” (Matt Zwolinski and John Tomasi, Bryan Caplan and again, David Friedman, David Henderson, and others), which seeks to integrate libertarianism with social justice. “Social justice” is one of those vaguely-specified, usually suspect phrases, defined by one defender of BHL as the position that “the moral justification of our
Bleeding-heart libertarianism? Read More »
On my trip home from Brazil, I had a lengthy layover in Panama, made enjoyable by two fun and smart young people who took me to the canal (awesome) and to lunch at a Panamanian fusion restaurant. Tasty — I’d never had fried plantain before. I was struck by Panama City’s skyline — it’s experiencing
An impression of Panama Read More »