News
USA Today | Mortgage rates dip this week, average is back below 3.6%
Average U.S. rates on fixed mortgages fell this week and are just slightly above record lows reached earlier this year. The low rates have contributed to a modest housing recovery.
CNN Money | Shell gets OK for Arctic drilling prep
The Obama administration has granted Royal Dutch Shell permission to begin drilling preparations off the coast of Alaska, bringing the region a step closer to offshore oil production.
Econ Comments & Analysis
Freeman | Inconceivable Complexity
A market economy is indescribably vast and complex—its success depends on so many intricate, changing details all somehow being made to work smoothly together that the “facts” that are essential to its thriving cannot be catalogued with anywhere near the completeness that can be achieved by a 21st-century scientist studying and cataloging the “facts” that enable sparrows to fly.
Bloomberg | Decline in U.S. Seen Without More Immigration: Cutting Research
The U.S.’s best 250 years are behind it, Northwestern University professor Robert Gordon writes in a paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, saying economic growth may gradually “sputter out.”
WSJ | George Gilder: The Real Reagan Lesson for Romney-Ryan
Follow Peter Drucker's advice: Don't solve problems, pursue opportunities. Like unlocking America's entrepreneurial value.
Blogs
Cato @ Liberty | Hayek Wasn’t a ‘Free Market Marxist’
Hayek was convinced that “no human mind can comprehend all the knowledge which guides the actions of society.”
Heritage Foundation | U.S. Farmers Seeing Record Profits, Thanks to Taxpayers and Government
The Financial Times reports that “U.S. farmers are heading for their most profitable year on record despite the worst drought in half a century as high grain prices and payouts from a federal crop insurance program compensate for a smaller harvest.”
Econlog | Conard on Trade and the Trade Defici
When offshore producers "dump" incremental production between full cost, we capture the benefit of lower prices. When foreign governments subsidize trade with tax credits or hold dollars to support their currencies, we capture the value of those subsidies.
CNN Money | Union membership down, income inequality up
The decline of union membership has been a key driver of income inequality in recent decades, a new report found.
Cato @ Liberty | After the Welfare State
Young people today are being robbed. Of their rights. Of their freedom. Of their dignity. Of their futures.
AEI | Shifting demographics may explain the ‘hollowing out’ of the middle class
In 1971, Pew calculated that 25% of U.S. adults were in the “lower income” category, but by 2011 the share of “lower income” Americans had increased to 29%.
