Join me at the Cato Institute on September 12 as we think through what can be done to stop this push toward “absolute control.” ⬇️ cato.org/events/financi… #CBDCs

Humans evolved to have strongly anthropomorphic models of how the world works. If something bad happens, we immediately look for someone (usually another human) to blame and punish. This is the “political mode”—find someone specific to punish or eliminate, and then the problem

When you ignore the considered views of scholars in a field, you rarely reach a well-considered view. But experts can be wrong, so let us consider Zephyr Teachout ‘s Atlantic article.🧵1

“Governments will never allow monetary competition, and even bankers do not understand the idea because they have all grown up in the system which is so completely dependent on central banks. So I think we need a roundabout way.” - Friedrich Hayek (1984) cato.org/policy-report/…

If they can’t criminalize cryptography by statute, they will criminalize it through enforcement.

As anthropologist Marshall Sahlins once said, “Economics, as constituted, is an anti-anthropology.” I’m here to prove him wrong. 😘 Stay tuned for “Towards an Anthropological Theory of Money,” coming soon in The Satoshi Papers.

Waiting for the announcement that all new technological development has to run through the Department of Safety, Security and Innovation and be approved by the Central Committee on Free and Fair Competition

“What is perhaps distinctive about the dynamic of difference as it is asserted in the WAT [War on Terror], however, is the belief that, in a globalised world, the transformation of the ‘other’ is essential for the defence, the very survival of the Western self. This could give

Creating value is not the same thing as generating profit. Great companies, like all great organizations, seek to generate value above all else. This means that profits will sometimes be sacrificed, especially in the near term. In the long term, however, these are the

The answer to Sahlins’s question—quite sadly—is that (socio)cultural anthropology stopped considering itself a science. Early anthropologists didn’t study the intricacies of specific human societies just for shits and giggles. They studied these things in order to develop a

What happens when GameDay goes to a Texas engineering school:

Fantastic lecture by economist Peter Boettke inaugurating the Initiative for the Study of a Stable Peace (ISSP). Boettke masterfully traces the lineage of mainline economics as the study of exchange rooted in human action as mediated and often laundered by institutions. The

One of the interesting things I’ve learned about MMTers is that their main political goal is full employment at any cost. They don’t distinguish between the “value” generated by massive government make-work projects and the value generated by entrepreneurial capitalism. The

Government hiring is inflating jobs numbers. Private sector jobs growth as % of total payroll growth fell to 38% in July, the lowest since the 2020 pandemic. Historically, every time the private payroll growth share fell below 40%, the US economy was in a recession. This also

Important research paper on the economics of migration. The consensus narrative today is that most migrants are the poorest of the poor—people with no economic hope in their home countries. The reality is more complicated. Many migrants are relatively poor, yes, but they are

A map of academics who write about 'degrowth'. (Further commentary seems unnecessary..)

Acemoglu is here exhibiting the classic logic of what he referred to in his own book, "The Narrow Corridor," as the "Cage of Norms." The Cage of Norms is a form of tyranny embedded in society rather than the state. The logic of the Cage of Norms is that "status is zero-sum," as

Curious about CBDCs and privacy? Check out our second panel on Evaluating Central Bank Digital Currencies, featuring Robert Bench, 𝕎𝕚𝕝𝕝𝕚𝕒𝕞 𝕁. 𝕃𝕦𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣, Natalie Smolenski, and Jay Stanley, moderated by Victoria Guida. Join us next Thursday, September 12! cato.org/events/financi…

A lot can be said about the causes of lower wealth inequality in the U.S. after the Second World War. Many believe that it’s because taxes were higher, but as economic historians have pointed out, almost nobody paid the higher rates. The main cause of greater wealth equality was