Economic and fiscal policy

Shika Dalmia The days when countries vied with each other for the national (dis)honor of spending their budgets to host the Olympics – or at least the Winter Olympics – may be fast passing. Why any normal city would even want to host these games is a mystery, given …

The international system has changed significantly in the past two months. The reason for this was the Russian Federation's bid to regain the status of regional hegemon in Eastern Europe that it lost two decades ago. The method chosen for this is reminiscent of the redistribution of the Old Continent around the two world wars and the creation of the USSR – …

The Natural Rights of Man and the Limits of Government Patrick Baron In The Law, Frédéric Bastiat presents the irrefutable maxim that human rights precede the formation of the state and, therefore, the collective actions of rulers cannot conflict with these primary rights. According to Bastiat, one can delegate to the state only those …

Gregory Brasiger Over the past 80 years, governments have been expected to provide more and more social services. This means ever-increasing costs to taxpayers, both ours and future generations yet to be born. Since governments have been almost constantly running in the red, they have become like cocaine addicts desperately looking for their next …

For the past ten days, all eyes have been on Ukraine. And while the media has been discussing various political issues at length – the claims to power of the president who fled the country, the various moves of the opposition that took power, and the very real possibility that Crimea could secede from Kiev and (possibly) return to …

The effects of the disastrous monetary and housing policies pursued by the American government in the early years of the new century became visible around 2008 with the so-called beginning of the financial (later economic) crisis. In law, the economic distortions had long been present, and what we observed after the bursting of the bubble was actually the experience …

Along with the policy of accumulating budget deficits and refusing to implement reforms, between the first and second readings of the budget law, a good idea emerged, albeit rather timidly – that at least the money of the poorest does not belong to the state. Although they will not be exempt from …

With the onset of the Great Recession, European Union (EU) governments loosened their purse strings and let automatic stabilizers operate, predictably swelling their budget deficits in the hope that rising public spending would get the economic engine going again. But the obstacles to growth in most EU economies are always …

Everyone knows about the record government spending, but the result is not in reality. Over the past 5 years, the political elite has successfully recreated the dream environment described in more than one or two generations of economics textbooks by implementing record-high fiscal and monetary stimuli. However, the positive results are not just late, they remain too …

The actions and statements of the first hundred days of the government have made it clear that the cabinet intends to spend more than the previous one. However, the question of where the financing of the bloated public spending will come from has not been answered unequivocally.