Pigs are prolific breeders, reaching sexual maturity at six months, and with each sow capable of giving birth to up to a dozen piglets, after gestation lasting an average 115 days. Thus it is a remarkable testimonial to the devastating impact of African swine flu that China’s pig population will take over […]
Author: Erik Sass
“Both parties have abandoned fiscal restraint”
“Both parties have “abandoned fiscal restraint” in favour of more borrowing” By Prof. Syed Kamall, courtesy of IEA Today’s election speeches show both parties have abandoned fiscal restraint in favour of increases in public spending to be paid for through extra borrowing. The Labour Shadow Chancellor has pledged to more than […]
Without reform the EU will self-destruct
“How to Destroy the European Union” By Prince Michael of Liechtenstein, courtesy of ECAEF and GIS Once, the “European idea” helped unite a war-weary continent. Now, overbearing central authorities, suffocating bureaucracies and reams of red tape are limiting the freedom that idea once promised. Europeans are losing trust in their […]
No, taxing the rich really doesn’t work
By Nicolas Lecaussin, courtesy of IREF and Contrepoints California is becoming the new France. Here we prefer the poor to the rich, and we do everything to tax and punish the well-off. Except it turns out it doesn’t work in California either — in fact it even has the opposite effect. In 2012, […]
Don’t let protests obscure Chile’s triumph
“Chile’s Success Story Is Difficult to Deny” By Ian Vásquez, courtesy of the Cato Institute Weeks after a 3.75% rise in metro fares in Santiago, Chile sparked violent protests by a small group of students that then generated more widespread disruption, mostly peaceful mass protests continue. Some observers have seized on the political […]
How to make the European Green New Deal work
By Grégory Claeys, Simone Tagliapietra, and Georg Zachmann, courtesy of the Bruegel Institute European Commission president-designate Ursula von der Leyen has made climate change a top priority, promising to propose a European Green Deal that would make Europe climate neutral by 2050. The European Green Deal should be conceived as a reallocation […]
Importing Bad Ideas: Let’s Not
“Foreign reference pricing” is just price controls by the backdoor The world is full of bad ideas that self-interested parties sometimes try to bring to these shores, swearing up and down they’re actually good: karaoke, kale, Neti pots, the Yugo, the Macarena, Gerard Depardieu — the list goes on. To this hall of shame must […]
New Protectionism: Still Protectionism and Bad Economics
By Veronique de Rugy, courtesy of the Mercatus Center For several years now, news headlines have reflected anxieties about the effects of globalization and freeing trade: Will jobs evaporate? Does China have an “unfair” advantage? Is the middle class disappearing? These fears need to be addressed, because they have resulted […]
Drug reference pricing threatens patient health, innovation
By Erik Sass, TES Editor-in-Chief Some recent proposals to lower drug prices are not just counterproductive but dangerous, according to an international panel of expert economists convened by the Competitive Enterprise Institute at the National Press Club on Tuesday, November 5, 2019. The panelists warned that “foreign reference pricing” — a practice […]
UK politics is already transformed
“The Brexodus of MPs will change the House Commons, whatever the election result” By Dr Alan Wager, courtesy of The UK in a Changing Europe On Tuesday, Philip Hammond said that one of the Prime Minister’s objectives in calling an early general election was to change the face of the Conservative party. […]