October 21, 2024
US Tariffs Will Not Bring Back Jobs from China
Although protectionism has become a rare point of bipartisan consensus in America, the public debate about it gets some basic facts wrong. Yes, trade is disruptive, but the US has been unwilling to take advantage of the opportunities generated by it and is instead trying in vain to recreate the jobs of the past. Washington,…
October 18, 2024
Harris and Trump Are Equally Silent on the Expanding US Debt
Donald Trump and Kamala Harris seem to agree that one of the nation’s most important challenges should remain unaddressed — a problem that has been slowly eroding the foundations of economic prosperity for decades. That problem? The national debt. The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office reports that federal debt held by the public averaged 48.3 per…
October 17, 2024
Harris’ Tax Plans Would Reduce Long-Term Prosperity. Trump’s Proposals Might Be Even Worse.
AEI Scholar and Director of Economic Policy Studies Michael R. Strain contributed to the Dispatch’s Symposium titled Economic Policy Experts: Doom, Thy Name Is Populism, as a group of experts outlined the many ways in which either potential administration’s populism could lead to poor policy and worse economic outcomes. Below is a section from Michael R. Strain contribution….
October 15, 2024
Lefty NYC Council Add-Ons to Mayor’s ‘City of Yes’ Would Worse Housing Crisis
Eric Adams’ chance for a lasting legacy hinges on his ambitious zoning and housing proposal dubbed “City of Yes” — poised to come before the City Council next week. But as some community groups seek to derail the plan, the hard-left council looks ready to undermine it — and convert it to the “City of Yes, But.” The key to Adams’…
October 15, 2024
Why Should the US Wish to Be More Like China?
In my new paper for the Aspen Economic Strategy Group, I argue: The protectionism, trade wars, and industrial policies of the Trump and Biden administrations have not succeeded at meeting their goals and likely will not succeed at meeting their goals. They have caused manufacturing employment to decline, not to increase. They have not reduced the…
October 14, 2024
Another Terrible Idea: Abolishing Child Welfare
The only thing surprising about Dorothy Roberts winning a MacArthur Foundation “genius grant” earlier this month is that it took the organization so long to do it. Roberts, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, has long been a darling of the critical-theory Left for her writings advocating the abolition of the child welfare…
October 11, 2024
Let’s Open the Black Box of Selective College Admissions
The aftermath of the 2023 Supreme Court ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard (SFFA) has put a spotlight on the capriciousness of admissions practices at selective colleges. In SFFA, the Supreme Court ruled that race-based admissions violate the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. After immense consternation about the impact of the ruling, dire warnings, and earnest discussion about…
October 11, 2024
HUD’s Housing Misfire: When Bureaucrats Know Better than Markets
Kamala Harris’s proposal for a $40 billion fund for local governments to explore “innovative” housing solutions will likely funnel money into projects burdened by self-defeating government-mandated affordability requirements, which HUD loves but markets abhor. By further empowering federal bureaucrats, it will do more harm than good. The case in point is the Department of Housing…
October 11, 2024
It’s time to face up to our social poverty problem
Over the past half-century, virtually all aspects of social life have deteriorated in America. We spend less time with fewer friends, form fewer families and have turned away from organized civic life and religious institutions. We trust less than we used to, and we provide each other less social support. Rather than owning up to our glaring social poverty problem, policymakers have…
October 10, 2024
Harris’s Housing Plan and the Five C’s That Will Derail It
Kamala Harris’s latest campaign ad pledges to “end America’s housing shortage by building 3 million new homes and rentals.” However, her plan is unlikely to significantly increase the overall housing supply. The cornerstone of her proposal is an expansion of the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC)—a program plagued by the Five Cs: Rather than expanding the LIHTC…