The history of money reveals a central challenge: how to design a system that most effectively facilitates the exchange of goods and services and generates prosperity while preventing the institutions that manage that system from abusing the trust that…Read more
Business & Innovation
While many of Ford Motor Company’s problems were shared by the rest of Detroit, the Dearborn automaker also faced some challenges all its own. Ford’s woes had not begun with the arrival of the Japanese in the 1960s or…Read more
In 1920, Americans spoke of “prosperity” and “depression,” of “inflation” and “deflation,” but not yet of an “economy.” Still less did they identify an organic enterprise for the government to manage and stimulate. In the 1920 Republican Party platform, the…Read more
Neither a borrower nor a lender be,” said Shakespeare’s Polonius. But economists of every stripe concur that some use of debt can be helpful to a household, a corporation, or a country. It is certainly the case that most households,…Read more
This growth reminded Americans of a similar period of major economic development, during the twenties, prior to the great depression which began with the collapse of Wall Street in 1929. The memory of those years convinced US governments not to…Read more
In early 1988, under the auspices of the Cato Institute, I visited China with the world’s leading expert on the theory of money, Milton Friedman. More than a decade earlier, Friedman had won a Nobel Prize for his influential…Read more
Since the outbreak of the financial crisis in the summer of 2007, I have faced any number of difficult moments. I have been grilled by the press, deposed by lawyers, called to testify before hostile members of Congress. I’ve…Read more
Imagine a country where average life expectancy is just forty-five years, infant mortality a staggering two hundred deaths per one thousand births, and fewer than 5 percent of people have access to indoor plumbing. In this country, the average person…Read more