Jack Watt



Articles by Jack Watt

Republicans Declare War on the American Economy

What is the Mises Institute?

The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard. Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.

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Tax the Rich? Not a Good Idea

What is the Mises Institute?

The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard. Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.

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Tax the Rich? Not a good idea

In the popular book “The Trading Game,” British author Gary Stevenson recounts his journey as a trader at a major U.S. bank in London. He has made lofty claims about his trading career and used it as a springboard for his successful YouTube channel, “Garys Economics.”A tailwind to his popularity is that he holds many fashionable views — for example, that money “is a token,” that printing money is akin to creating wealth, and that capitalism is the problem. He holds these views while noticing that the inflation in the prices of consumables and assets hurt working people at the expense of the wealthy.An impassioned take on wealth inequality animates his work, but his is a common case. Having observed a problem, ad hoc and confused theorizing stands in the way of identifying the root causes

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British Sound Money MP Replaced by Labor Party Apparatchik: A Sign of the Times

Sound money advocate and Conservative Party MP for Wycombe Steve Baker lost his seat in the general election that took place on 4th July–curious timing for a sitting Prime Minister to have called an election his party was always near-certain to lose. As Americans were celebrating Independence Day, the remnant Brits opposed to the government meddling in every aspect of their lives were bracing for a prime minister who describes himself as a socialist–and thinks that sits comfortably with the platitude of “putting the country first.”That is not to say that the remnant had been enjoying anything close to a bearably innocuous level of government. In a short list of memorable and more recent highlights from a long list of offences (they entered power in 2010), the outgoing Conservative

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Is Migration a Tool of the Consumptive Class?

An unfortunate consequence of increased wealth is the growth of the parasitic consumptive class of political and cultural elites. Labor migrations often follow in the wake of damage that elites do.
Original Article: Is Migration a Tool of the Consumptive Class?

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Is Migration a Tool of the Consumptive Class?

Migration is part of the wider concept of economic freedom. This makes it desirable if prosperity is the goal of policy. But more applicable to the current attitudes and values of Western leaders than mundane economic arguments, migration presents an opportunity to increase the pool from which they extract real income. This is required in the face of poor demographics and growing socialistic ambitions.
The extraction is achieved by taxation and inflation, which create huge costs to the productive sector regardless of its makeup. In this sense, any large-scale migration is likely to be an example of states coming to the right answer in the wrong way.
Factors Seek the Highest Rent
The mobility of factors of production is always desirable. Migration is simply the mobility of labor over

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Bidenomics: A Boom That Awaits an Inevitable Bust

While unemployment currently is low and the rate of inflation has fallen somewhat, Bidenomics is setting off a boom that is unsustainable. We know what happens next.
Original Article: "Bidenomics: A Boom That Awaits an Inevitable Bust"

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Bidenomics: A Boom That Awaits an Inevitable Bust

Joe Biden recently claimed on Twitter that “Bidenomics” has increased the real wages of low-income workers. A counterclaim was made through Twitter’s Community Notes that wages adjusted for inflation were actually lower at the time of Biden’s claim. But data without theory is unsatisfying, so it is worth asking if conditions of the last few years have been conducive to higher real wages, especially for lower earners.
The Boom
First, we need to establish the current situation. As the Fed has raised its benchmark rate, measures of broad money growth in the United States have been trending downward. But this comes at the tail end of an expansionary boom. In 2020–21, Fed and Treasury policies combined to provide broad money growth that was unprecedented during peacetime. While broad money

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