Articles

Can governments rely on outdated rationales to justify onerous regulation?

September 16, 2014 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

In 1952, Emmett Ashford became the first African American umpire in organized baseball and Dwight Eisenhower was elected President of the United States. That same year, the Pennsylvania legislature decided that funeral homes needed to be heavily regulated. Under a 1952 regulation, funeral directors must obtain a license and build expensive “ ...

Articles

A new approach to species protection

September 30, 2014 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

Laws can worsen the problem they aim to fix. For example, in colonial India, the British government placed a bounty on cobras to rid Delhi of a snake infestation. When entrepreneurs began to breed cobras to cash in on the bounty, the government scrapped the program. So the snake breeders released their cobras into the … ...

Articles

On punishing plumbers

October 15, 2014 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

In the midst of a struggling economy, California has decided to crack down on the nefarious handymen that you hire to fix your stuff. Thanks to a new California law, honest people trying to scrape by doing repair or construction work now face greater barriers to feeding their families. California has long required costly licenses for construct ...

Articles

Dictators of the dump

October 28, 2014 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

What do a bureaucrat, an identity thief, and a street bum have in common? They all want to pick through your rubbish. Seattle recently announced that it will fine individuals and businesses whenever compostable material accounts for over ten percent of their waste. Trash collectors will inspect bins and ticket folks who throw out too much ...

Articles

Obamacare's defenders resort to low blows

November 11, 2014 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty once said, “it means just what I choose it to mean–neither more nor less.” Congress lacks that luxury because the judiciary judges the meaning of its words. However, in a venomous New York Times article, Paul Krugman says that judges who try to rely on the plain language of Ob ...

Articles

Who can prevent wildfires?

November 24, 2014 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

Smokey the Bear isn’t telling the whole story — you’re not the only one who can prevent wildfires. The National Forest Service can help, too. But if environmentalists have their way, the Service’s fire prevention efforts will suffer. … ...

Articles

The erosion of traditional fair play

December 01, 2014 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

Charlie Brown always fell for Lucy’s trick of whipping the football away just as he approached for a kick. One Thanksgiving, Charlie Brown hesitated, but Lucy insisted that football was a Thanksgiving tradition. As Charlie Brown lay on his back after being duped again, Lucy smiled down and said, “Isn’t it peculiar, Charlie Bro ...

Articles

Star Wars Episode VI.I : Anti-development Strikes Back

December 09, 2014 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

When Luke Skywalker crash-landed on Yoda’s swampy planet, Luke turned to R2D2 and said, “If you’re saying that coming here was a bad idea, I’m starting to agree with you.” George Lucas may be starting to feel the same regret about the location of his proposed Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. … ...

Articles

Markets and morality

December 23, 2014 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

When the ghost of Jacob Marley bemoaned his eternal torment, Scrooge spluttered, “But you were always a good man of business, Jacob.” “Business!” cried the ghost. “Mankind was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The deals of my trade were but a drop of water in the compre ...