Donald J. Boudreaux
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Financial
How Not to Run a Household — or a Country
Donald and Melania Trump are eating breakfast together at Mar-a-Lago on the morning of January 21, 2029. At noon on…
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Financial
Tariffs Rest on Distrust of Citizens
Creating a long list of the familiar flaws in protectionists’ thinking is easy. Protectionists don’t realize that, although trade ‘destroys’…
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Financial
Tariffs Are Missing the Real Enemy: Yesterday’s Products
Are President Trump’s tariffs proving that two and a half centuries of economic analysis exaggerated the virtues of free trade?…
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Financial
HL Mencken Knew Politicians: ‘Merchants of Delusion’
Rare is the day that passes during which I don’t, at least once (and usually more than once), say to…
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Financial
Trump’s Trade War Undermines the Dollar’s Global Reserve Status
Donald Trump is famously hostile to US trade deficits. He believes not only that these deficits harm the US economy,…
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Financial
Why Consumption—Not Production—Is the True Goal of Economic Activity
Just as an all-powerful monarch dictates what his subjects may and may not do — and just as no subject…
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Financial
Mayday! Mayday! We Have Abuse of Emergency Powers
Despite being a proud member of the University of Virginia School of Law Class of 1992, I’m an economist, not…
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Financial
Protectionist Angst Is ‘Made in America’ — So Are Lots of Other Things
Over the years, I — like all defenders of free trade — have had countless conversations with protectionists who are…
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Financial
Regime Uncertainty and Market Uncertainty
The Great Depression formally began in August 1929, two months before Black Tuesday. Initially, the economic downturn that began late…
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Financial
‘Twin Deficits’: A Tale of Fiscal Folly, Not Trade Failure
No notion in economics is responsible for more misunderstanding and misguided government policies than that of the “balance of trade”…
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