A few weeks ago, we looked into the state of commodity programs from the perspective of farmers. We found that farmers tend to make a great deal of money off these “insurance” programs, as they are designed to function more…
Another day, another restaurant with black-and-green “Save Our Tips” signs plastered all over. It’s become a common experience for me as a denizen of The Swamp to see these signs whenever I go to a restaurant or bar in the…
America is a generous country. Taxpayers can take pride in the fact that, under the terms of the 2014 Farm Bill, they will send more than $2 billion worth of food to needy countries this year. Thanks to these aid…
Coal and nuclear power plants have good friends in the Energy Department. And they’re hardly afraid to cash in on those friendships. FirstEnergy Solutions has asked the Energy Department to utilize emergency powers under Section 202(c) of the Federal Power…
This morning, President Trump announced that he was imposing tariffs on steel and aluminum. That in itself would be nothing new, but the targets of these tariffs were what made Trump’s announcement surprising. They were none other than Canada, Mexico,…
In the wake of Seattle’s decision to enact an Employee Head Tax (EHT) to fight homelessness, media reporting has largely focused on the backlash from large businesses such as Amazon. It’s not hard to see why. Amazon, which employs more…
As the battle over the Farm Bill has raged in the background, we’ve been spending the last few weeks looking at the cronyism that is the country’s current agriculture program. We’ve looked at sugar cronyism benefiting a few large producers…
Bad news: there’s another national security crisis. And no, it has nothing to do with cancelling the Iran deal or the Singapore summit. It’s cars. We don’t make enough cars. Or something like that. At least, that’s the rationale the…
Crony capitalism appears ubiquitous in today’s economy, but quantifying its costs can be difficult. Fortunately, the Mackinac Center did it for us. A study out of the Michigan-based think tank provides an interesting case study into the scope of crony…
