Search the Archives

I’ll give you the underlying answer, even if it might take a bit of contemplation for it to make sense. 1) Minority peoples tend to be progressive. This has to do with the problem of ‘signaling’ (status) as well as access to opportunity and power. There  is nothing special about jewish progressivism other than they’re…

The Keynesian debate promoted by such writers as Krugman, Delong, Thoma, Smith, and Stiglitz is misleading. Human beings are well aware that spending can increase demand, and that demand will improve the economy. The problem is, that we’re also aware of the externalities that are caused by that spending: the increase in government interference in…

Politics is the process of creating and using institutions to issue orders, codified as laws, to commit organized violence to coerce others to alter their behavior, and to separate them from their property.  There is no subject that is free from political criticism. Because there are no limits to human desires to alter the behavior…

The Muslim countries were part of the Ottoman empire.  The Ottomans could not modernize for complex reasons, and could not compete with western expansion. When the empire fell, the westerners attempted to establish order in the conquered territories, by creating small states. And they promoted leaders in those states. Oil has been a strategic necessity…

No, the effort today has changed from arguing in favor of labor, to arguing in favor of the poor and minorities. And from arguing for rents, to arguing for direct redistribution. Marxism and the managed economy have been discredited. In no small part, Labor is no longer a significant force in society, they are less…

It would violate the principle of free speech.It would increase corruption at the cost of decreasing an annoyance.It would very likely decrease voter participation https://www.quora.com/Should-political-advertisements-be-banned-from-television

You would need to understand the term “Socialism”1) Original meaning: central control of the means of production.2) Current meaning: redistributive democracy -central ownership of the profits from individual actions. The first It has a bad name because: In the name of socialism nearly a hundred million people died (disruption of incentives). Because it’s economically impossible…

They represent different sets of alliances.  Mostly those that want to expand the state and those who want to contract it. https://www.quora.com/unanswered/What-are-the-differences-between-the-political-parties-in-the-USA

When I read Hayek, Schumpeter and Hoppe I became a libertarian. https://www.quora.com/unanswered/When-has-a-fact-any-fact-caused-you-to-radically-change-your-politics

OWS and The tea party are both likely to be long term phenomena caused by structural changes in the USA, and in the world economy. OWS still exists as a movement of sorts, but declined for two reasons:1) A failure to develop a platform of specific actions.  Movements need policy objectives and they didn’t propose…

Go visit Intrade.com.  Monitor it there. It’s quite accurate.  The electorate is polarized with only about 12-15% of people uncommitted to one party or the other.  Elections are determined by these uncommitted people.  These uncommitted people tend to vote based upon what their friends tell them.  Many people do not vote policy they vote likability.…

There are a series of possible stimuli available from the short term to the long term.1) Spending – Fiscal Policy: the government borrows money, then spends it on any number of projects.  This puts money in the hands of consumers, consumers spend on things not related to the projects, and businesses respond in order to…

I agree with Dave, despite being an advocate of Scrum in most circumstances. A controversial argument: Scrum was developed for: 1) Small teams of  talented people.2) Strong buy in from the client(s) who are effectively members of the team.3) To compensate for the evolutionary accumulation of knowledge as development progresses. HOWEVER1) It is less contractually…

They don’t. While it costs nothing to abstain from theft, fraud and violence, it costs something to administer defense and disputes.  The libertarian argument is that these things can be produced by private organizations. They have produced a great deal of work that demonstrates how and why that private production of defense is both possible…

There are plenty of treatments of the subject that discuss the decline of the ‘civic society’ and decline of ‘civic participation’ in society, because the state has destroyed the motivation for, and the ability of people to engage in civic behavior.  The ‘corporatization and bureaucratization’ of charity. The reason is ostensibly that conservatism provides charity…

Um.. This is one of those problems that’s really nonsense.  All employees should be compensated at market rates. Otherwise if you are lower, they won’t stay, if they are over, your competition will eat you. Compensation is not equitable WITHIN A COMPANY. It is equitable across ALL COMPANIES. Do not fall into the trap of…

From Karl Smith by way of Noah Smith While you don’t want to get trapped into people thinking that cyclical concerns are liberal concerns … I don’t think it actually helps to offer middle ground. The problem is that too much of the debate is manufactured. That is, it is debate for debate’s sake. There…

What do conservatives, liberals, and libertarians believe is the hidden agenda of the other two political philosophies? From Quora. Conservatives Conservatives believe in a meritocratic hierarchical society where a) there are as few ‘cheaters’ living off the efforts of others as is posible, b) that enfranchisement should be earned, c) that government should resolve conflicts…

Fascinating concept by Amy above.  I’ll try to be a bit more precise and technical. Conservatives believe in a meritocratic hierarchical society where there are as few ‘cheaters’ living off the efforts of others as is posible, and that enfranchisement should be earned, and that government should resolve conflicts. And that civic duties should be…

Interesting posts on Modeled Behavior in response to this post by Bryan Caplan on Econlog Suppose there are ten people on a desert island. One, named Able Abel, is extremely able. With a hard day’s work, Able can produce enough to feed all ten people on the island. Eight islanders are marginally able. With a…