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Some Covid Links

Posted: 21 Dec 2020 03:53 AM PST
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(Don Boudreaux)




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Richard Salsman explains the wisdom of learning from the science learning
from all science and of avoiding quack science. A slice:

Today’s most vocal admonishers condone political-bureaucratic micromanaging
and controls; they seem to love shaming innocent people into obeying
draconian, life-stifling edicts. If millions must sacrifice and suffer, so
what? Most religions (secular and otherwise) say that this signifies
“virtue.” Covid-19 bullies use science language to shield themselves from
criticism and cloak their nefarious designs; they seem to sense that most
Americans still respect science (not despotism).

Whats the evidence on 2020s lockdowns effect at controlling the spread of
the coronavirus?

Christian Britschgi reports on just how absurd lockdown mandates can be.

Hmm. I wonder where the flu has gone in 2020.

Russ Roberts converses, at EconTalk, with economist Emily Oster about
Covid-inspired school closings.

Matthew Crawford warns of the dangers of safetyism. A slice:

I suspect the ease with which we have lately accepted the authority of
health experts to reshape the contours of our common life is due to the
fact that safetyism has largely displaced other moral sensibilities that
might offer some resistance. At the level of sentiment, there appears to be
a feedback loop wherein the safer we become, the more intolerable any
remaining risk appears. At the level of bureaucratic grasping, we can note
that emergency powers are seldom relinquished once the emergency has
passed. Together, these dynamics make up a kind of ratchet mechanism that
moves in only one direction, tightening against the human spirit.

Acquiescence in this appears to be most prevalent among the meritocrats who
staff the managerial layer of society. Deferring to expert authority is a
habit inculcated in the “knowledge economy”, naturally enough; the basic
currency of this economy is epistemic prestige.

For those of you who still trust the likes of Andrew Cuomo with power,
Robby Soave reports some information that you might want to consider.




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Quotation of the Day

Posted: 21 Dec 2020 02:02 AM PST
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(Don Boudreaux)




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is from page 151 of University of Glasgow Senior Lecturer Craig Smith’s
superb 2020 book, Adam Smith:

The mortgaging of future tax revenues and other such financial instruments
were a genuine worry for [Adam] Smith. Government financial innovation was
likely to be managed by spendthrifts or projectors’ like John Law, Smith’s
fellow Scotsman, whose speculation led to the near ruin of the French
state. In addition to the possibility of corruption and mismanagement, such
schemes had another fatal consequence: capital that might be lent to
productive enterprises from the economy and passed into the unproductive
hands of the state.

DBx: That government might be able to borrow at zero percent interest does
not make government borrowing costless. The real resources used in the
thus-funded government projects could have been used otherwise. Even if you
have good reason to suppose that government will generally use these
resources to better effect for the people as a whole than will private
enterprises, you have no business asserting that government borrowing at
low or even zero interest rates is costless.




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Can Anyone Tell Me

Posted: 20 Dec 2020 06:30 PM PST
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(Don Boudreaux)




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why we should take seriously politicians who think that concocting
increases in nominal spending power will keep the economy secure in the
face of (1) government lockdowns that forcibly prevent a great deal of
production from taking place, and (2) government- and media-stirred popular
derangement that further dampens actual productive activity?

We are governed a more appropriate term is lorded over by people who, if
we judge them by their publicly spoken words, are imbeciles. And these
imbeciles, sadly, are cheered on by most intellectuals (some of whom even
boast advanced degrees in economics).




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Truth Through Humor

Posted: 20 Dec 2020 09:48 AM PST
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(Don Boudreaux)




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J.P. Sears is hilarious. Hes also wise.






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Some Links

Posted: 20 Dec 2020 09:05 AM PST
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(Don Boudreaux)




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Devon Williams writes a beautiful eulogy for her father, the great Walter
Williams. A slice:

As a father, he was also a teacher. My dad taught me that hard work
eclipses talent or natural gifts every day of the week and twice on Sunday.
He taught me how to drive like a Philadelphia cabbie and how to parallel
park in a space equal to the length of my vehicle. He taught me that the
best time to look for a job is when you already have one and that
opportunities are often masked as disappointments.

He taught me that play is necessary, but that it’s more fun when your work
is finished. He taught me to love my life and the people in it. He taught
me to drink the wine and not to save it for a special occasion. And he
taught me that family is always my safe place to land.

Also remembering Walter Williams is a former GMU Econ PhD student, Ted
Murphy, from long ago. A slice:

Walter’s influence goes well beyond my own education. The thousands of
students whom I have taught are unwitting beneficiaries of Walter’s
insistence on high standards, yet understanding that none of us not know it
all. I attempted to pass on Walter’s focus on problem solving technique and
reliance on evidence. Many academics claim to follow the science wherever
it leads, but all too many wilt when the results they find are
counter-intuitive or politically unpopular. Walter truly followed the
evidence wherever it led. In Walter’s case, it often resulted in
disagreement with what many people wanted him to believe.

Peter Earle rightly laments the return of the trickle-down ruse. A slice:

Second, no political party, economist, or economic textbook has ever
referred to “trickle-down” anything as a policy tool or outcome. As Thomas
Sowell wrote in 2014: “The “trickle-down” theory cannot be found in even
the most voluminous scholarly studies of economic theories – including J.
A. Schumpeter’s monumental ‘History of Economic Analysis,’ more than a
thousand pages long and printed in very small type.” It is a description
typically employed by opponents of free markets and economic liberty, and
one which like so many others (“fairness,” “hard-working Americans,”
“equality“) has become so freighted with political suggestion as to become
a near-metonym.

Most important of all, the phrase fails to accurately describe any economic
phenomenon or outcome. “Trickle-down economics” is, beyond being a phrase
used to evoke an emotional reaction among a certain sector of the populace,
a profound illustration of economic ignorance.

Jacob Sullum writes about efforts to rein in the banana-republic practice
of civil asset forfeiture.

J.D. Tuccille identifies a silver lining around the dense, dark cloud of
lockdown tyranny.

As documented in the Wall Street Journal, the elected officials who gather
regularly in Sacramento might, about most economic matters, be dumber than
dung. But they are among the worlds leading experts at destroying an
economy. Heres the opening paragraph:

California’s Legislature is considering a wealth tax on residents,
part-year residents, and any person who spends more than 60 days inside the
state’s borders in a single year. Even those who move out of state would
continue to be subject to the tax for a decade—a provision that calls to
mind the Eagles’ famous “Hotel California” lyric: “You can check out any
time you like, but you can never leave.”

Catos Simon Lester corrects many of the errors that infect Farah Stockmans
recent New York Times op-ed on the World Trade Organization. A slice:

There are also problems in the piece related to mythology about 1990s
capitalism. In the 1990s, the piece states, “The United States, the world’s
sole superpower, embraced an almost messianic belief in the ability of
unfettered capitalism to improve lives around the world.” It is certainly
true that many people were pretty high on capitalism in the 1990s, given
the experiences with socialism around the world, but capitalism was hardly
“unfettered” and the U.S. government was certainly not “messianic” about it
at this time. Debates about deregulation and privatization have a real
impact, and at times various governments move back and forth on the
continuum a bit, in one direction or the other. But regardless of any
marginal successes we on the free market side have had, we have never come
close to making capitalism “unfettered.” There are plenty of fetters still
in place. And the U.S. government was always pretty practical in its
approach, advocating for and using subsidies and trade restrictions in
areas where it wanted to impose them.




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Standing and Delivering Against Lockdown Tyranny

Posted: 20 Dec 2020 07:31 AM PST
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(Don Boudreaux)




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Heres Van Morrisons and Eric Claptons new protest song against the tyranny
of Covid-19 lockdowns.






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