in turn enable further types of interactions beyond the realm of business. The genius of the market is that it enables a wide array of individuals, groupings, and associations to organize spontaneously to advance their various interests in a cooperative fashion that yields win-win arrangements.
Featured Posts
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Distinguished guests celebrate liberty movement jubilee
I recently returned to D.C. from Tampa, Florida, where I attended the 60th anniversary meeting (“Diamond Jubilee”) of the Philadelphia Society. For those who…
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Free the Economy podcast: Frontier economics with Kendall Cotton
In this week’s episode we cover the diamond jubilee of the Philadelphia Society, the cost of government regulation in the UK, the…
Blog
Bees are flourishing again. Thanks, capitalism!
You can relax, everyone: The honeybees are back. As Andrew Van Dorn of the Washington Post reported recently, America suddenly now has a record…
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RealClear Radio Hour: Budding CEOs, Women, and Politics
On this week’s episode, Jeff Sandefer tells how children younger than 10 are wowing Shark Tank investors and Sarah Skwire compares the feminism of free…
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RealClear Radio Hour: Taxpayers on the Hook
This week on RealClear Radio Hour, Michael Tanner tallies Uncle Sam’s ballooning entitlement debt and Romina Boccia pulls back the cover on the Beltway crony…
Blog
Celebrating Two Great Economists: Bruce Yandle and Julian Simon
I’d like to second my colleague Fred’s birthday wishes for the distinguished economist Bruce Yandle of Clemson University.
Blog
Happy Birthday to Economist Bruce Yandle
Bruce Yandle – a great economic scholar at Clemson University for many years and recipient of the 2016 Julian Simon Award – reaches his 83rd…
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The Cinematic Legacy of CEI Studios
Over the years we’ve hosted a lot of policy and social events in our current office, but we’ve also written and filmed some creative videos…
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RealClear Radio Hour: U.S. Constitutionalist and Soviet Dissident
In this episode of RealClear Radio Hour, we contrast constitutionalism and socialism.
Blog
Politics and Economics Collide with Pokémon Go
It seems strange to think it’s been barely a week since Pokémon Go became the dominant pop culture phenomenon of the summer. Publications better known…
Blog
Religious and Economic Liberty Are Intertwined
The massacre in Orlando was a tragic reminder that we’re at war—against hate, against extremism, and against intolerance. Although there are many contributing factors…
Blog
Building on the Optimism of “Uber-Positive” Attitudes
There’s a new resource for understanding the state of play between politics and developments in the sharing economy, the pleasantly slim volume by the Manhattan…
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Why Shouldn’t the Energy Department Run the Entire Economy?
New Energy Department standards for dehumidifiers promise massive benefits. Depending on which set of numbers you prefer (the link goes to the Energy Department’s own…
Blog
What’s Right with Business Schools?
Jane Shaw of the Pope Center for Higher Education Policy has a compelling new commentary out this week on the state of business schools.
Blog
Inequality: Policies That Work, and Policies That Don’t
CEI recently released a pair of papers by Iain Murray and me about economic inequality. The first encourages activists to ask the right questions: think…
Blog
More on “Inequality”
In serendipitous timing, the Institute of Economic Affairs in London released a new study this week entitled “Never Mind The Gap: Why we…
Blog
Raise, Don’t Level: New CEI Papers on Inequality and Poverty Relief
Economic inequality is one of today’s defining issues. How to address it? Iain Murray and I offer an unconventional approach in a new two-part CEI…
Blog
Thomas Piketty’s False Argument for Expanding the Government
Left-wing economist Thomas Piketty is treated like a “rock star” by many progressives for giving a veneer of legitimacy to the economic myths they…
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Business Leaders Mount the Barricades
This has been a good week for capitalist backbone. As Kim Strassel discusses in the Wall Street Journal today, we’ve seen two high profile…
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CEOs Confront Anti-Capitalist Rhetoric
Another CEO of a big American company has spoken up about the charge that he and his employees are “destroying the moral fabric” of…
Blog
How to Address Income Inequality
Over at the Foundation for Economic Education, Iain Murray and I give a short preview of our two forthcoming CEI papers on income inequality…
Blog
Is GE a Capitalist Good Guy or a Corporate Bad Guy?
General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt has an interesting op-ed today in the Washington Post, hitting back against charges that his company is “destroying…
National Review
Tentatively for Universal Basic Income
Michael Strain, as is only to be expected, does a great job outlining the pros and cons of a universal basic income (UBI) before…
Products
Free Market Groups Putting Property Principles into Action
When I told a friend some years ago that I was going to be working in a think tank, he replied, “Huh. I always wondered…
Blog
Three Economists Had the Answer to the President’s Questions
Last night at the State of the Union, the President asked three questions regarding domestic policy (I’ll leave the foreign policy question to others). They…
Blog
Much to Be Thankful For
Thanksgiving is tomorrow, and all of us have much to be thankful for. Over at Inside Sources, I have a Julian Simon-inspired take on the…
Blog
Thanksgiving: Massachusetts Discovers Property Rights
Thanksgiving is a day layered in tradition and myth. The standard story makes much of the creative efforts of our ancestors, the assistance provided by…
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A Fundamental Misunderstanding of Free Enterprise
Today, in The Guardian, columnist Zoe Williams repeats an idea often advanced by progressives, that entrepreneurial activity is dependent on the action of others, especially “government,”…
Blog
Anti-Capitalism on Campus
Prof. Brad Thompson of Clemson University writes this week in Minding the Campus on the impact of corporate donations to institutions of higher education. In particular, he describes…
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Calling All Public Choice Scholars
Earlier this month the Cato Institute generously hosted a small roundtable discussion of CEI’s recent study “Virtuous Capitalism: Why there Is Less Corruption in…
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Virtuous Capitalism in Theory and Practice
Government is responsible for billions and billions of dollars of corruption and corporate welfare. Considering the potential returns on investment compared to honest entrepreneurship, it…
Study
Reviving Capitalism
The near-death and rebirth of American railroads is a case study in business leaders fending off regulation.
Blog
Sell a Kidney, Save a Life
Last week I blogged about the idea that some things should not be part of a market economy, and highlighted one rather silly example of…
Blog
Virtuous Capitalism, or, Why So Little Rent-Seeking?
The venerable Fred Smith and I have a new paper out today. Click here to read it. In the paper, we try to solve the Tullock…
Study
Virtuous Capitalism
Is there less corruption in business than we think?…
The Courier-Journal
Schnatter: Free enterprise benefits society
The Courier-Journal discusses why Papa John's CEO John Schnatter supports free enterprise by referencing data from a report by CEI. Simply look at…
Blog
Betting on the Future: 25 Years Later
Today is the 25th anniversary of the famous bet between economist Julian Simon and biologist Paul Ehrlich over the price of five metals: chromium, copper,…
Blog
Free Enterprise: Sometimes We Forget
When we find ourselves debating specific issues having to do with economics and business, we often forget how overwhelming the evidence is for the superiority…
Blog
World Bank Increases Number of Poor
The World Bank is considering changing its definition of what constitutes extreme poverty, raising the level below which someone is treated as extremely poor from $1.25…
Blog
A First Look at Markets without Limits
Georgetown University professors Jason Brennan and Pete Jaworski (left) have a new book out with a fascinating premise: anything that it is morally permissible…
Blog
The Government Makes a Terrible Boyfriend
He’s from the government, and he’s here to help. That’s the comic premise of this summer’s best YouTube video series, “Love Gov,” from the…
Blog
Mount Vernon Cheers: A Song to Commemorate “I, Whiskey”
Our Indiegogo campaign for CEI’s new documentary “I Whiskey” is closing soon. So far, we have raised almost $75,000, but it’s not over yet.
Blog
William Faulkner Said it Best: “Civilization Begins with Distillation”
"Making whiskey is but one piece of the Great Story of Spirits. The Big Picture is the story of incremental progress, of continual innovation by…
Blog
Why Thieves Hate Free Markets
Don Boudreaux over at Café Hayek has just given a 2015 boost to a smart 2012 video from Learn Liberty on social cooperation in…
Blog
Bastiat Society Rallies Business Leaders Together
My venerable colleague Fred Smith and I just returned from the Hoosier State, where we were honored to be guests of the Indianapolis chapter of the …
Blog
What Cartoons Can Teach Us about Capitalism
The Freeman has an excellent article by FEE advisory board member Robert Anthony Peters on economic lessons in popular culture—in this case focusing on the wealthiest…
Blog
Do Conservatives Really Care about the Poor?
American Enterprise Institute president Arthur Brooks has a new book out this week, The Conservative Heart: How to Build a Fairer, Happier, and More Prosperous…
Blog
Join the “I, Whiskey” Team
The Competitive Enterprise Institute's newest film project, I, Whiskey: The Spirit of the Market, is currently in production, and you can help make it…
Blog
Advocating Free Trade, Not Foreign Aid for the World’s Poverty
A Review of the Poverty Cure Documentary Series Poverty Cure is a six part documentary series directed and hosted by Michael Matheson Miller, produced by…
Blog
2015 CEI Dinner Movie: The Magnificent 7
Complete with cowboy boots, wagon wheels, lamps made out of whiskey bottles, and wanted posters of the most “notorious” U.S. regulators—if you’re talking to a…
Blog
Excerpts from Carly Fiorina’s Address at CEI’s Annual Dinner
Keynote address by business and nonprofit leader Carly Fiorina delivered at the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s annual dinner on June 11, 2015. Excerpts from text as…
Blog
How Capitalism Created the Modern Family
Prof. Steve Horwitz of St. Lawrence University has a fascinating article up at MarketWatch, in which he argues that many of the major changes in family…
News Release
CEI’s John Berlau Responds to Department of Labor’s Fiduciary Rule
Today, the Labor Department is expected to release its long-awaited "fiduciary rule." Ostensibly aimed at addressing potential conflicts of interest by brokers who offer retirement investment advice, Competitive…