David Henderson reviews, in Regulation, Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century. A slice:
But if there is anything we know in economics, it is that incentives matter. An annual tax on capital will reduce the incentive to create capital. With less capital than otherwise, the marginal product of workers will be lower than otherwise. Bottom line: Piketty’s proposed tax on capital would hurt labor.
How does Piketty handle this serious problem? He doesn’t.
(Read David’s review in full. It’s excellent. And while you’re at it, notice that the review following David’s is Dwight Lee’s review of Jeremy Rifkin’s The Zero Marginal Cost Society. Read that review, too. Indeed, read all of the reviews; each is superb.)
Pierre Lemieux writes informatively about the vacuity of the political ‘we.’
Bryan Caplan points out, quite rightly, that conservatives also embrace moral relativism (although most do not realize it).
I’m eager to read this new book by Thomas Hall.
Annie Lowrey explains that Amazon is not a monopoly. (HT Tyler Cowen) (I bloast that these two 1996 papers by Andy Kleit and me – here, and here – are relevant to this discussion.)
