January 8, 2010

Reviewed Briefly: The Mystery of Capital

Filed under: Reviewed Briefly — Tags: , , ,

I just finished reading Hernando De Soto’s The Mystery of Capital.  The book was great, and I wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone who cares about capitalism, globalization, development, or  third world poverty.  It is cliche to say that a book “challenges expectations”, but it certainly did mine, perhaps more than any book I have read.  De Soto makes a very intriguing claim about third world poverty – that it is exacerbated by a clash between inflexible law and actual human practice – that has difficult ramifications for property laws in the third world.

I intend to follow up this post with a few of the more tangential thoughts I had while reading.  For a very powerful elaboration of the main argument (bad laws create extralegality, which exacerbates poverty) get the book!

The Mystery of Capital was The Atlas Network’s #1 pick for pro-liberty book of the decade.  I have read and also recommend their #2 pick Radicals for Capitalism.

said Wallace Forman @ 4:18 PM. Comments (0)

November 11, 2009

The Berlin Wall Today

Filed under: Immigration — Tags: , , , ,

Volokh had a couple of posts up commemorating the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall – here, here, and here for example.

I am too young to remember the fall of the Berlin Wall or the collapse of the Soviet Union, but the idea of the wall, as I learned about it later, made quite an impression on me.  The Communists had voluntarily constructed a physical testament to their citizens’ fevered desire to escape.  And once that wall came down, the beneficent West welcomed the refugees with open arms.  But because I am too young to remember the Berlin Wall, another wall looms larger in my mind.

Today, a sickening parody of the past is unfolding.  A new wall goes up along our border, and the United States is building it.  It builds it not to keep its own rich well-fed citizens trapped inside, but to keep the poor and desperate out.  The Berlin Wall made a sick sort of sense.  The Communists needed to prevent the human material of their social experiments from escaping.  But the wall today is an aimless and demented cruelty, a jeering testament to our nation’s willingness to sacrifice its own prosperity, if only it can make our neighbors a little poorer.  It denies both the citizens inside our borders and those without the best operation of the capitalist system that was once the hope of desperate East Berliners.

Once we demanded that the Soviets tear down their wall.  Today we insist that our neighbors help us seal off our border.  So today, I look forward to the twentieth anniversary of the fall of a different wall, and a time when we will have seen it for the travesty that it is.

said Wallace Forman @ 4:05 PM. Comments (0)

September 11, 2009

Capitalism and Socialism are Opposites, Not “Two Complementary, Good Ideas”

Filed under: Americans for Tax Reform,Health Care,Socialism — Tags: , , , , ,

The following was originally written for Americans for Tax Reform, where I am an intern:

Perhaps the most frustratingly incoherent part of Obama speech Wednesday was his repeated portrayal of the market and government planning as just two possible, non-exhaustive, mutually-reinforcing “solutions” to the current health care “crisis”.

There are those on the left who believe that the only way to fix the system is through a single-payer system like Canada’s — (applause) — where we would severely restrict the private insurance market and have the government provide coverage for everybody.  On the right, there are those who argue that we should end employer-based systems and leave individuals to buy health insurance on their own…. I have to say that there are arguments to be made for both these approaches.

Obama likes to present his plan as a sort of third way between government-run health care and the market, incorporating, as he said, “the best ideas of both parties together”. This is essentially nonsense. Our health care system cannot be made “more free market” and “more government-regulated” simultaneously.

The free market and government planning are exhaustive opposites. Every health care choice is either made freely by consumers selecting their most favored option, or it is chosen for them by government mandates. Under a market system, for example, consumers can either choose to buy health insurance through their employer or on the individual market. In a planned economy, by contrast, the government may order them to buy through their employer.

President Obama leaves little doubt as to which direction he will take our health care system:

Now, even if we provide these affordable options, there may be those — especially the young and the healthy — who still want to take the risk and go without coverage.  There may still be companies that refuse to do right by their workers by giving them coverage.

…

And that’s why under my plan, individuals will be required to carry basic health insurance — just as most states require you to carry auto insurance.  (Applause.)  Likewise — likewise, businesses will be required to either offer their workers health care, or chip in to help cover the cost of their workers.

…

But we can’t have large businesses and individuals who can afford coverage game the system by avoiding responsibility to themselves or their employees.  Improving our health care system only works if everybody does their part.

Obama’s plan, at its heart, requires that consumers be deprived of their free choice, so that the government can micromanage insurance premiums based on arbitrary notions of “just cost distributions”. This is, at its heart, socialism.

said Wallace Forman @ 5:54 PM. Comments (0)