Free Republic

Medicine is probably the only area of our economy where corporations, private equity investors, venture capitalists and Wall Street tycoons don’t deliver value. Corporate medicine is big business, but it’s not Sam Walton trying to bring low-cost, high quality health care to a town near you. Private equity funds are targeting areas of medicine where they can gouge patients, extort insurers and loot employee health plans. Free-market capitalism has repeatedly proven to provide consumers the most goods at the lowest prices. The benefit of capitalism is self-evident. Walmart, Dollar General and Amazon are great examples. Walmart brought low-cost goods to...

Dr. Richard Ebeling, professor of economics at The Citadel, The Military College of South Carolina, and my longtime friend and colleague, has written an important article, "Business Ethics and Morality of the Marketplace," appearing in the American Institute for Economic Research. Its importance and timeliness is enhanced by so many of America's youth, led by academic hacks, having fallen prey to the siren song of socialism. In a key section of his article, Ebeling lays out what he calls the ethical principles of free markets. He says: "The hallmark of a truly free market is that all associations and relationships...

Many stores sought to open earlier than Black Friday to relieve some of the pressure of shoppers swarming for good deals, but there have already been incidents at Walmarts around the country. At one Walmart, two women in hijabs fought over a vacuum, forcing several employees to intervene:

Recently there seem to be an increasing number of claims that American prosperity resulted from slavery. This is presented as justification for the renewed calls for reparations for slavery, which Democrats are using in an attempt to gain support as we approach the next presidential election. But did slavery actually create the wealth of the U.S.? Does this claim have any historical basis in fact, or is this a distortion of history to influence the views of voters? We should all agree that slavery is an immoral institution in which people are treated as property and work, not for themselves,...

We study history to learn from it. If we can discover what worked and what didn’t work, we can use this knowledge wisely to create a better future. Studying the triumph of American industry, for example, is important because it is the story of how the United States became the world’s leading economic power. Free markets worked well; government intervention usually failed. The years when this happened, from 1865 to the early 1900s, saw the U.S. encourage entrepreneurs indirectly by limiting government. Slavery was abolished and so was the income tax. Federal spending was slashed and federal budgets had surpluses...

Reflections on the free market, at Chicago’s McCormick Place I like trade shows and conferences. I’ve attended a lot of them - and I’ve given speeches at a few - and I have always found them to be a wonderful microcosm of both society and the economy. No matter how troubled a city or state may be, the trade show is a place to be re-invigorated about the potential in our own American economy and even in the world at large. This week, for example, walking through the Housewares Show at Chicago’s McCormick Place, I was reminded of a number...

amika Capone thought she was making a smart call by traveling to Mexico for bariatric surgery. Her doctor had urged her to have the procedure to reduce her out-of-control weight and blood pressure. But her husband's health insurance would not cover the $17,500 bill. After a friend got the surgery in Tijuana for $4,000, Capone decided to do the same.

You may have to go all the way back to the late 20th century to recall an article in Harper’s magazine that was worth reading, but the current issue features an article from the controversial French novelist Michel Houellebecq that defends Donald Trump (“Donald Trump Is a Good President“) in ways that will drive just about everybody out of their minds But what’s most remarkable about the new American policies is certainly the country’s position on trade, and there Trump has been like a healthy breath of fresh air; you’ve really done well to elect a president with origins in...

Our young people are not the first Americans to admire tyrants and cutthroats. W.E.B. Du Bois, writing in the National Guardian in 1953, said, "Stalin was a great man; few other men of the 20th century approach his stature." Walter Duranty called Stalin "the greatest living statesman" and "a quiet, unobtrusive man." There was even leftist admiration for Hitler and fellow fascist Benito Mussolini. When Hitler came to power in January 1933, George Bernard Shaw described him as "a very remarkable man, a very able man." President Franklin Roosevelt called Mussolini "admirable," and he was "deeply impressed by what he...

Students at an Ohio middle school were asked to decide who they would leave behind if the world was about to end, using age, religion and other descriptions as markers for their decisions. The assignment sparked widespread uproar. “Whom to Leave Behind” asked students at Roberts Middle School in Cuyahoga Falls to choose eight out of 12 people to put into a space ship and take to a different planet because the world was ending, according to the Cleveland Plain-Dealer. Choices included a homosexual pro athlete, a militant African-American medical student and a female movie star who was a victim...

President Trump said Thursday, “Twitter 'SHADOW BANNING' prominent Republicans. Not good," Trump tweeted. "We will look into this discriminatory and illegal practice at once! Many complaints.” Shadow banning, also known as ghost banning, is when a user and their content visibility is limited from the online viewers in a way that does not make it clear to the user that they have been banned. For example, Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., Mark Meadows, R-N.C., Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel all failed to appear on Twitter’s autofill search box when users typed in their names, Vice News reported...

Companies kept up the hiring pace in March, adding 241,000 positions as employment in construction and manufacturing surged, according to a report Wednesday from ADP and Moody’s Analytics. Economists surveyed by Reuters had been expecting the report to show that private payrolls had gained by 205,000. This was the fifth straight month that the ADP/Moody’s count showed private payrolls up by at least 200,000, though March saw a slight decline from the upwardly revised 246,000 in February. On a year-over-year basis, March 2018 nearly doubled the 122,000 total from the previous year. “The job market is rip-roaring,” Mark Zandi, Moody’s...

The PBS NewsHour, which I love for telling me what to think and when to think it, had a piece yesterday about a black lesbian woman who claimed she couldn't get a mortgage because racist banks wouldn't lend to a black person.  When her Japanese lesbian partner applied for a loan, however, she quickly got it. Fifty years after the federal Fair Housing Act banned racial discrimination in lending, African Americans and Latinos continue to be routinely denied conventional mortgage loans at rates far higher than their white counterparts. It found a pattern of troubling denials for people of color...

Roscosmos, is considering offering future space tourists the chance to do their own spacewalk for $100 million price tag.

Looking for something to be thankful for? Try this. You have it better than billionaire John Rockefeller (1839-1937) ever did. Rockefeller founded the Standard Oil Co. and became one of the richest men in American history. When he died, he had a fortune worth around $1.4 billion, or $25 billion in today’s dollars. He had more money. You have better stuff. How many lights did you turn on today? Thomas Edison didn’t patent the incandescent light bulb until Rockefeller was in his 40s. There wasn’t an electrical grid, so small generators powered the first light bulbs. Today, electricity is an...

We took a look at Macron’s character; does he mean what he says?... What kind of a leader will he be? We analyzed many of his speeches, including his recent 2-hour address to the parliament on opening day, and we’ve found his rhetoric to be similar to that of U.S. President Ronald Reagan. Now, all politicians give great speeches. What’s notable about Macron’s is his brazen criticism of the state and its socialist policies; his gentle admonitions to his countrymen about the poor state of affairs that they’ve allowed their country to end up in. Here’s a sample of his...

This may come as a surprise, but support for the free market is reaching record highs in Latin America. And what’s even more amazing, capitalism is most popular in countries where leftist leaders lash out against it on a daily basis. In theory, this could pave the way for a golden era for foreign and domestic investors in the region. The startling information about the rise of pro-capitalist sentiment in Latin America is part of soon-to-be-released figures from Latinobarómetro, an annual regional survey. According to the data, the percentage of people in the region who agree with the premise that...

Medicare’s trust fund will run out of money in just over 10 years, according to a new report from the program’s trustees. Once that happens, the federal government won’t collect enough in payroll taxes to cover beneficiaries’ hospital bills. Congress could hike taxes to cover the shortfall. Or it could ration care to save money. Or it could modernize and restructure Medicare — by giving beneficiaries means-tested vouchers to buy private insurance. Doing so would protect taxpayers now, preserve the program for future generations and even provide higher-quality care to seniors. Medicare‘s spending isn’t sustainable. Congress can stave off massive...

Last week, a dear friend of Accuracy in Academia, author M. Stanton Evans (1934-2015), would have turned 83. Although he focused most of his energies in his later years on researching and writing about the history of espionage and internal security in the United States, he had quite a background in economics as well, much to the benefit of his readers over the course of his career. Indeed, he studied under the noted Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises. On at least half a dozen occasions, I heard him outline what he saw as five essentials for a functioning economy. They...

When the governor called, Sherry Japhet answered. Japhet is a freelance makeup artist from Boise, Idaho. She's worked in the business for more than 20 years, but without a license. That's never been a problem for her. She's landed gigs from coast-to-coast, working on television sets and for fashion magazines. Some of those calls came from Idaho Gov. Butch Otter. Japhet has helped Otter and his wife, Lori, look their best for televised public service announcements and political ads. No more, she says.