By William R. Collier, Jr. Public trust in government is at an all-time low thanks to widespread mismanagement of the COVID-19 response. This presents an opportunity not only to reform failing institutions, but to build new ones with greater accountability. In this dynamic new environment, the concept of Free Private Cities (FPCs) popularized […]
Author: Erik Sass
Europe should let private sector use digital ID verification
By William Echikson, courtesy of the Center for European Policy Studies Europe should move fast to allow the private sector to leverage its public digital verification system, especially in view of the changes to communication brought about by the COVID-19 crisis, concludes this new study. Identity verification remains a time-consuming, arduous […]
COVID-19 Deception by China Demands New Era of Global Scrutiny
By Michael Auslin, courtesy of the Mercatus Center The COVID-19 pandemic that began in Wuhan, China, has led to a sharp intensification in tensions between the United States and China. With clear evidence that Beijing covered up the extent and nature of the epidemic in its early months, using the World Health Organization (WHO) to mislead […]
Dropping qualified immunity would change police behavior
“Yes, Abolishing Qualified Immunity Will Likely Alter Police Behavior” By Jay Schweikert, courtesy of the Cato Institute Yesterday, the New York Times ran an op‐ed by Professor Daniel Epps, titled “Abolishing Qualified Immunity Is Unlikely to Alter Police Behavior.” I’m fully aware that op‐ed authors generally don’t get to pick the titles of […]
Washington Beyond the Headlines: Feds Shouldn’t Cover State Budget Shortfalls
By Andy Blom, TES Washington Editor They say bad things come in threes. Well, we’ve had a pandemic, a wave of protests and riots, so what else does 2020 have in store for us? But no matter the obstacles, free market policy people keep right on working, offering perspective and policy options to lead […]
Cut Red Tape to Boost the COVID-19 Recovery
By Oliver McPherson-Smith, American Consumer Institute Recent employment data suggests that America is on the road to economic recovery in the wake of the COVID-19 lockdowns. Despite the nascent evidence of better times ahead, the economy in 2020 will not inevitably look like it did in late 2019. To help workers find jobs in this new […]
Alarmist Media Focusing On Wrong COVID-19 Metric
By Erik Sass, TES Editor-in-Chief Fears of a “second wave” of COVID-19, including in parts of the country that have not yet been badly hit, are growing in response to two nearly simultaneous events: the lifting of lockdowns and the wave of protests over George Floyd’s death. The mainstream media is fanning the flames […]
UK needs tax cuts, regulatory clear-out to speed recovery
“New report outlines deregulatory and tax-cutting measures to reboot Britain” By Julian Jessop and Len Shackleton, courtesy of IEA The uncertainty created by the COVID-19 crisis has reinvigorated many old debates about the role of the state, says a new report from the Institute of Economic Affairs and Civitas, written by IEA Economics Fellow […]
“Lives versus economy” was a false choice. The truth is far more complex
By Nicolas Marques, courtesy of the Institut Molinari We often hear it said that managing a pandemic such as the coronavirus depends on societal choices. The alternative would be to save lives or savings. Health and economic data show that the reality is far more complex than this caricatural dilemma. Some countries are able to reconcile […]
Women, young adults suffer worst pandemic’s mental health effects
By James Banks and Xiaowei Wu, courtesy of the Institute for Fiscal Studies The COVID-19 episode has had substantial negative impacts on mental health across the population. The biggest impacts have been on the gender and age groups – broadly women and the young – that already had relatively low levels of mental […]