Chris Hughes, a co-founder of Facebook and co-chairman of the Economic Security Project, has recently written an impassioned plea in the New York Times calling for the government to break up Facebook. The piece is well worth reading for the light it sheds on the early days of the social media giant, as well as for the questions it raises regarding privacy and social media use in general, but brings more heat than light in its analysis of Facebook as...

After eight seasons, fans of the series that became a pop culture icon could see the long-awaited final episode on Sunday and finally find out who sat on the Iron Throne. Below are some of my observations about the last episode of Game of Thrones and what one can learn from the final unfolding of the series. 1) Is Daenerys a neoconservative? She was, for many, the heroine of the story until the last episode. Many saw her as an...

This article appeared originally in Forbes. Read the entire article here. Last week, while visiting the political and business capitals of Brazil, I was able to study the plan for deregulating the Brazilian economy and speak with some of the plan’s architects. The MP da Liberdade Economica (MPLE) the economic freedom provisional measure, has the same standing as any law; it has been signed by President Jair Bolsonaro. In 60 days regulations to implement it will expand its effects. It...

Once again, the national news reports that the government has legally prevented a Christian ministry from expanding its services for fear it will lose tax revenue. This opposition proves that politicians overvalue the role of government and undervalue the immense benefits that churches provide munity. Religious institutions generate trillions of dollars for the U.S. economy every year, according to a recent study. When a nonprofit petitions a zoning board, politicians see only the lost property taxes they can no longer...

In the academic world there are several well-known “twoness theses”, says Acton research fellow Andrew McGinnis, arguments by scholars that there are in one historical person two identifiable and contradictory lines of thought that warrant depicting the individual as divided. It seems that anyone who writes and publishes enough material will be susceptible to a twoness thesis. In some ways it is a mark that you have made it as an author. It means you have published, lectured, or preached...

Note: This is post #122 in a weekly video series on basic economics. Imagine that you’re the Fed and monetary policy is your domain, says Alex Tabarrok. The economy has been doing fine: inflation isn’t too high, GDP is growing at a reasonable rate. But then something happens. Consumer confidence drops. The economy shrinks. What do you do? In this video by Marginal Revolution University, Tabarrok discusses the details of this scenario and how the Fed might respond. He looks...

The Mongol ruler Genghis Khan once asked his generals, “What is the greatest happiness in life?” When they answered that it was going hunting on a spring day while riding a beautiful horse, Genghis said they were wrong. The greatest pleasure, he said, is to be founding in vanquishing ones enemies and robbing them of their wealth. In other words, to the man who has more living descendants than almost any person in history, happiness was found in looting. The...

On Monday, May 13, the U.S. Supreme Court let stand a lower court ruling that politicians can legally forbid churches from expanding their ministries in order to maximize the government’s tax revenues. Justices declined to hear the case Tree of Life Christian Schools v. City of Upper Arlington. What happened in the Tree of Life Christian Schools case? Briefly, the Tree of Life Christian Schools serves 583 students, 44 percent of whom are ethnic minorities. A robust 99 percent of...

Over the weekend, Theresa May’s cross-party Brexit negotiations collapsed, but their worst ideas live on. At 4 p.m. London time, Prime Minister May unveiled the terms of what she calls a “bold” effort to pass her Withdrawal Agreement Bill (WAB). She condensed her “new Brexit deal” into 10 points: Our NewBrexitDeal makes a 10-point offer to everyone in Parliament who wants to deliver the result of the referendum: The government will seek to conclude alternative arrangements to replace the backstop...

Today is the feast day of St. Bernardine of Siena, a fifteenth-century Franciscan known as the “apostle of Italy” for his preaching and efforts to revive the faith in his time. So many flocked to hear him preach, in fact, that he had to give his sermons outside. Bernardine is also known, though, for his writings and particularly for his systematization of Scholastic economics, which built on the earlier work of St. Anselm, St. Thomas Aquinas, and others and helped...