The adage that whoever pays the piper calls the tune is one of the oldest laws of economics. Monday’s Supreme Court ruling on military recruiters at universities and law schools is just the latest example of this principle. In an…
Category: Other
R&D can’t live on free-market funding alone
University of Minnesota economics professor Vernon Ruttan gets right to the point in his latest book, “Is War Necessary for Economic Growth? Military Procurement and Technology Development” (Oxford University Press, 2005). Ruttan, now retired from the applied economics department, devoted…
Fed rookie’s financial resume is short
Kevin Warsh, President Bush’s recent appointee to the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors, has thin qualifications for the job — to put it mildly. What message the president is trying to send in nominating someone with so little relevant experience…
Federal power on trial in pollution case
Our decentralized federal-state-local government system has been enormously important in the political and economic success of our country. Letting decisions be made at the lowest appropriate level usually means more effective and responsive government and better use of resources. In…
Willing to pay more for day care? Then you will
The price of anything depends on both supply and demand. A recent national report on child care noted that the cost of such care in Minnesota is high relative to incomes. The report received a lot of local press. Most…
Biofuels are no cure-all for energy needs
When discussing economic policies it is important to not let rhetoric overpower reality. That happened in a recent, much-reprinted New York Times article that argued “endless fields of corn in the Midwest can be distilled into endless gallons of ethanol…
Forget about trade “deficit”
We would be better off if the government simply stopped releasing trade-balance information. These monthly numbers are so widely misinterpreted that society is harmed rather than helped by the exercise. There are no better examples than last Friday’s release of…
Housing’s slow cool-down eases pain
As obvious as this sounds, moderate change over time is usually less painful than sudden dramatic shifts. This was true when I played with balloons as a child. If the balloon popped in the first hour, I was devastated. If…
Budget debate degenerates into political game
Our nation’s budget process is broken, and fixing it will take political courage, something remarkably lacking in our nation right now. President Bush’s proposed budget certainly did not inspire great cheering this week. In itself, that does not mean much.…
Wherever you go, introspection is valuable
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil — The poet Robert Burns’ advice “to see ourselves as others see us” is as valuable for societies as for individuals. Unfortunately, societies examine themselves just as rarely as humans do. Ignoring the obvious is human…