Economic Nonsense: 41. Immigration is bad for the economy
Many argue that immigration harms the economy. Some suppose that immigrants are attracted by welfare, and come to live off benefits at the taxpayers’ expense. Others assert the contradictory claim...
View ArticleEconomic Nonsense: 42. A planned economy is more rational than an unplanned one
Very few people advocate an unplanned economy. At a simple level people might suppose that having intelligent and informed people direct the economy is better than having it proceed by blind chance....
View ArticleEconomic Nonsense: 43. Private enterprise cannot generate public goods such...
In fact private enterprise supplies many public goods, although few commentators think they should provide all public goods. Lighthouses are often cited as an example of essential services that only...
View ArticleEconomic Nonsense: 44. Big business thrives on poor country sweatshops and...
In undeveloped countries people struggle to survive in agricultural economies. Life is characterized by dawn to dusk heavy labour, even for children, and the rewards are meagre. Diet is poor and the...
View ArticleEconomic Nonsense: 45. Unbridled capitalism brought about the Great Depression
In the popular account the stock market went wild in the late 1920s, with people gambling recklessly on stocks and shares, often with money they didn’t have. Shares could only go up, they thought, but...
View ArticleEconomic Nonsense: 46. Profit is a sign of exploitation
No. Profit is the reward for investment. An investor defers gratification and uses their money instead to try to make more money later. Profit is the compensation he or she receives for doing this....
View ArticleEconomic Nonsense: 47. The state should pay for university education because...
University education benefits society in several ways. A skilled, university-educated workforce can boost economic growth and make society richer than it would have been without them. Less well-off...
View ArticleEconomic Nonsense: 48. Labour Unions are essential to improve wages and...
It is actually improved productivity, not labour unions, that has improved the rewards of labour. People earned less money in former times because productivity was low. People were paid according to...
View ArticleEconomic Nonsense: 49. Government was wrong to use austerity to deal with the...
Gordon Brown as Chancellor and Prime Minister spent money profusely, believing that he could spend the British people’s money more appropriately than they could spend it themselves, and by a political...
View ArticleEconomic Nonsense: 50. Capitalism is unstable, subject to periodic crises,...
Capitalism is not a fixed thing, but rather a process which develops and changes in response to changing conditions, and especially changing technology. To say it is unstable is basically to say that...
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