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Coincidentally (for it is indeed just that) given today’s “Quotation of the Day [2],” George Selgin is inspired by John Morley to defend the exploration and advocacy of worthy ideas even when such ideas are politically impractical [3].
While preparing for a class that I’ll teach this semester on the Economics of Sustainability, I’m running across lots of great books, articles, and blog posts that I missed when they were first published. (I’m running across also lots of awful books, articles, and blog posts.) This 2011 post by Sean Corrigan is excellent [5]. (HT Matt Ridley [6])
Writing a few weeks ago in the National Post, Alex Epstein – author of the splendid new book The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels [7] – encourages us to make the world a better place by using more fossil fuels [8].
Maxim Lott reviews some botched environmental predictions for 2015 [9]. A slice:
A Pennsylvania state government “Student and Teacher Guide [10]” reads: “Some estimates of the oil reserves suggest that by the year 2015 we will have used all of our accessible oil supply.”
Yet the Earth still has oil: at least 1.6 trillion gallons of proven reserves, according to [11] the Energy Information Administration, a US government agency. In fact, proven reserves have more than doubled over the last couple decades, as technological innovation made more oil accessible.
Here’s the website [12] for the expanded second edition of Gerald P. O’Driscoll, Jr.’s and Mario Rizzo’s classic volume, originally published in 1985, The Economics of Time and Ignorance (now retitled Austrian Economics Re-Examined.) (HT Pete Boettke)
Larry Reed Socratically explores arguments for the minimum wage [13].