In Canada, cutting company tax hasn’t decreased company tax revenue for the Canadian government:
The great Dr Arthur Laffer explained to an IPA audience in 2015 how lower taxes increase growth and, subsequently, tax revenue. When President Reagan did this it was called “voodoo economics“. Now that President Trump is cutting America’s corporate tax rate from 35% to 15% to kick-start growth, it’s being labelled “magic beans“. For the full story, read this editorial from Investor’s Business Daily on Tuesday.
Middlebury College was the liberal arts school where an address by Charles Murray was violently closed down by protesters in March. Who do you think the College apologised to last week? The female professor attacked by protesters? Charles Murray? Students wishing to hear Murray speak? Nup, they apologised to the rioters who shut the event down.
Here’s a fresh twist on the usual US college cultural appropriation story. Officials at America University in Washington DC told a fraternity their proposed badminton tournament fundraiser was “appropriating culture” – they just wouldn’t tell them which one…
The reason why sports network ESPN is failing and just laid off 100 people? Their programming is too political (and left wing), according to Dan McLaughlin in National Review yesterday.
I know you guys love these – AEI has updated its list of “spectacularly wrong predictions” made around the first Earth Day in 1970. My favourite is 18. (I’m sure you already knew, but Earth Day was last Saturday).
Guess which country the UN just appointed to the UN Commission on the Status of Women? Saudi Arabia of course, as reported on Andrew Bolt’s blog on Monday.
Article of the week:
Thomas E. Woods, Jr wrote this excellent review of Kevin Gutzman’s new book Thomas Jefferson, Revolutionary: A Radical’s Struggle to Remake America on Mises Wire yesterday. Its crucial point of difference from most recent Jefferson biographies is that it focuses on his radical political philosophies and not his admittedly interesting and controversial personal life.
IPA Staff Pick:
Each week an IPA staff member shares what they have enjoyed recently. Today: Scott Hargreaves
This 3,300 word long piece in Current Affairs by Luke Savage last week describes how Aaron Sorkin’s The West Wing has virtually unmatched cultural staying power among TV dramas. Savage says that’s because it represents Democrats as Democrats imagine themselves. He argues that’s a problem because it makes technocratic governance seem honourable and “shows everything wrong with the Democratic worldview”.
Here’s what else the IPA said this week:
- Andrew Bushnell, It’s the values, stupid – IPA Review
- Simon Breheny, If we are serious about Australian democracy, then we need voluntary voting – Sky News Politics HQ
- Peter Gregory and Simon Breheny, Episode 7 – The Young IPA Podcast
