In this year’s State of the Union address, two words were notably absent from President Obama’s speech to the nation: economic freedom. The address was littered with calls for more government spending, and the need for the wealthy to pay their “fair share,” but it was notably lacking in the language of free enterprise, entrepreneurship, […]
At the moment, all conversations about licencing and regulating occupations seem to revolve around Uber. While governments across the world fret about safety concerns and the ‘unfairness’ towards conventional taxis, consumers are taking full advantage of the lower prices and increased competition Uber has injected into the market. Much as taxi drivers protest (and they […]
This will be the last time anti-globalisers protest at the World Economic Forum in Davos. From 2016, the ministers, chief executives, columnists and assorted quangocrats who gather at the Swiss resort won’t see so much as a stray dreadlock: eco-protesters say the meeting is no longer worth picketing. You can see why they might feel […]
As the ECB meets tomorrow to decide its next move, it can now add the risk of a deflationary spiral to the list of the currency bloc’s afflictions. With rising real debt burdens, perennially high unemployment and stagnant growth, it is difficult to be optimistic about the Eurozone. The timidity of the response to this […]
I ran into Dominic Lawson last week and all we could talk about was the piece he wrote recently for the Daily Mail on his broken dishwasher. You can read it – All I want for Christmas… is a dishwasher that works – here. I congratulated him because he had captured perfectly the modern frustration […]
During the Occupy événements in 2011, I happened to be passing the protest camp at St Paul’s Cathedral, and decided to stop for a chat. The activists were a mixed bunch. Some were obviously full-time agitators – sour, sun-burned and sinister. Others, though, were bright, idealistic youngsters who seemed motivated by an uncomplicated desire to […]
So the French are unhappy with EU competition policy. In fact, the French are unhappy with any sort of competition, including the competition for French companies and the competition from imports. They are unhappy with the prospect of American competition with their less efficient farmers, and of competition from American Internet giants. They might be […]
Wimbledon is, for most people, the world’s tennis tournament. It happens to take place in Britain, but it isn’t really a British event. Almost no one alive can remember a previous occasion when a British men’s singles champion was defending his title. The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club opens its doors to the […]
Imagine that a certain Grantham grocer had decided to sell his business. His daughter would have not taken it well had a government official intervened and tried to prevent him, concerned perhaps that there would have been a threat to the employment prospects of a delivery boy or that the purchaser might want to rationalise […]
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