The Open Market Blog

• By: Lene Johansen
• 03/25/2008

If you think that picking up the phone book sized federal budget is a bit daunting, you might want to get the graphic version.

• By: Lene Johansen
• 03/25/2008

Just an interesting FYI.

• By: Michelle Minton
• 03/24/2008

Today the LA Times published an interesting opinion article that opposes health care mandates in a way I hadn’t yet heard. The authors claim…

• By: Fran Smith
• 03/24/2008

Eli— Here’s another theory — fluoridation of water is very widespread in the U.S. but is very limited in England. (About 10 percent of…

• By: Iain Murray
• 03/24/2008

Fran’s post raises an important point about trade-offs and the ossifying effects of mandates (why on earth don’t we have a much better system…

• By: Hans Bader
• 03/24/2008

U.S. immigration authorities have denied Saman Ahmad permission to stay permanently in the U.S.  He put his life on the line for four years as…

• By: Doug Bandow
• 03/24/2008

To believe Democratic politicians, the U.S. has entered an era of near-laissez faire economics.  Regulatory agencies have faded away.  Uncle Sam has gone on vacation. …

• By: Lene Johansen
• 03/24/2008

The suppliers, producers, and retailers in the industrial organic food chain have long lamented about the possibility of grains from plants bred with molecular plant…

• By: Lene Johansen
• 03/24/2008

Kate Ackley wrote a great story about the most recent attempt to create a regulatory approval process for generic biotechnology medications on the Hill.

• By: Lene Johansen
• 03/24/2008

I have lost the count on the number of stories I have seen about coral reefs dying out because of global warming.  A recent…

• By: Eli Lehrer
• 03/24/2008

Fark.com, the world’s best workplace time-waster, links to a story in the Sun about a British couple that will use a 5 million…

• By: Ivan Osorio
• 03/22/2008

In his latest Examiner column, Tim Carney looks at hedge fund manager Julian Robertson’s lobbying for cap-and-trade legislation and bet on a U.S. economic…

• By: Doug Bandow
• 03/21/2008

Certainly not the UN!  The debate, such as it is, over global warming has been increasingly driven by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.  The…

• By: Fran Smith
• 03/21/2008

I am disappointed that the X Prize did not note that there may be trade offs involved — that a zillion mph vehicle may well…

• By: Hans Bader
• 03/21/2008

The Wall Street Journal comments on House leaders’ pandering to trial lawyers by blocking “liability protection for phone companies that assisted the government…

• By: Fred L. Smith, Jr.
• 03/21/2008

The X Prize is apparently underwritten in part by the Progressive Insurance company – a firm that, I believe, is active in auto insurance. I…

• By: Doug Bandow
• 03/21/2008

The British may love babies, but they sure don’t show it.  Maternity wards often are full and have to be closed to new mothers. …

• By: Eli Lehrer
• 03/21/2008

Fran, I think the Progressive Automotive X Prize is a great idea. It may work where the government has failed. Existing government programs…

• By: Fran Smith
• 03/21/2008

The X Prize Foundation has announced a $10 million automotive prize: The newly renamed Progressive Automotive X PRIZE is an international competition designed…

• By: Hans Bader
• 03/21/2008

“Inflation is walloping Americans with low and moderate incomes as the prices of staples have soared far faster than those of luxuries,” reports…

• By: John Berlau
• 03/21/2008

I've been withholding comment about the Federal Reserve Bank's Bear Stearns intervention until I've had a chance to appraise the deal, including the extent of…

• By: Hans Bader
• 03/20/2008

The politically-correct National Fair Housing Alliance (NFHA) has brought a disturbing lawsuit against an insurance company for an product aimed at church-goers, which provides…

• By: Fran Smith
• 03/20/2008

Commodity prices plunge is the big news in the markets today. According to Bloomberg today, commodities are– . . . heading for the biggest…

• By: Iain Murray
• 03/20/2008

CEI’s friends at the Liberty Institute in New Delhi have launched a new website, InDefenceofLiberty.org. Of particular interest to openmarket readers might be the…

• By: Fran Smith
• 03/20/2008

I was checking around for international census information at the U.S. Census Department site (useful for a lot of issues) and thought some of…

• By: Michelle Minton
• 03/20/2008

To respond to Hans’s post: in order for the government to force Geno’s to serve everyone who stumbles up to the window indiscriminately, it…

• By: Hans Bader
• 03/20/2008

There’s a tendency among many liberal “civil rights” bureaucrats to assume that any practice they dislike must be “discriminatory.”  Thus, when businesses mandate the use…

• By: Michelle Minton
• 03/20/2008

James Stewart that is, in the movie Shenandoah. While considering the various angles of the DC gun ban debate, I happened to…

• By: Fran Smith
• 03/19/2008

Again, a really interesting “Trade Fact of the Week” from the Progressive Policy Institute.  With all the negative talk about trade, PPI points out…

• By: Hans Bader
• 03/19/2008

Michigan’s Proposition 2, which bans racial preferences and set-asides in government contracts, state jobs, and public university admissions, was upheld yesterday by a federal…

• By: Marlo Lewis, Jr.
• 03/18/2008

James Hynryshyn condemns the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) as “enemies of reason and democracy” and, worse (in his estimation), “liars.” What provokes his ire…

• By: Eli Lehrer
• 03/18/2008

Anthony Minghella, a film director adored by critics and liked by audiences, has died at 54. Minghella (link goes to his IMDb page),…

• By: Hans Bader
• 03/18/2008

Under the Sarbanes-Oxley law, regulators have imposed incredibly expensive requirements for auditing American businesses, costing our economy $35 billion annually, and reducing the…

• By: Doug Bandow
• 03/18/2008

It’s good to know that the administrators of Sheridan Middle School in New Haven are on top of their game. When two students engaged in…

• By: Hans Bader
• 03/17/2008

The Federal Reserve is trying to save irresponsible borrowers from themselves by cutting interest rates to ridiculously low levels, even though that will trigger increased…

• By: Lene Johansen
• 03/17/2008

A U.S. carbon-trade exchange opened up for business today, amidst the financial chaos created by the Fed bail out of Bear Stearns. It…

• By: Doug Bandow
• 03/17/2008

There are a lot of reasons for believers in limited government to be discouraged. But sometimes that discouragement can be turned into triumph. Truth be…

• By: William Yeatman
• 03/17/2008

It was a big weekend for the delicate diplomacy of climate change.In Brussels, EU ministers met to try to figure out how to slash greenhouse…

• By: Eli Lehrer
• 03/17/2008

Re-watching Dirty Dancing — a movie far better than its reputation — last night inspired me to do some Internet research. I was pleased…

• By: Eli Lehrer
• 03/17/2008

The Washington Post runs a very interesting story about things on their way out. The list includes “truly blind dates” (we now have Google),…

• By: Lene Johansen
• 03/17/2008

The Cultural Revolution has finally made it to Norway. The Labor party’s Minister of Culture has spent the summer traversing the music festivals of the…

• By: Eli Lehrer
• 03/17/2008

Today, of course America woke up to news that JP Morgan Chase has bought out Bear Stearns for $2 a share. (It was trading…

• By: Fran Smith
• 03/13/2008

Over the last year, we’ve heard a lot about rising food prices because of the federal government’s mandates and subsidies for corn-based ethanol. Here’s…

• By: Fran Smith
• 03/13/2008

A new five-dollar bill debuts today — and it’s prettier and more secure than the last version, according to the…

• By: Fran Smith
• 03/13/2008

Do cold and snowy winters lead to “snow rage”? So says the police spokesperson in Quebec, where winter has been bad this year, leading…

• By: Doug Bandow
• 03/13/2008

The Europeans are threatening to impose tariffs on the U.S. if it fails to knuckle under and accept some international climate regulatory system–undoubtedly drafted to…

• By: Eli Lehrer
• 03/13/2008

Today’s Washington Post runs a story about the services provided by high-priced call girls. According to the story, high class prostitutes provide “a pledge…