Acton Institute Powerblog

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Search results for "crony capitalism"
June 23, 2016

Nintendo, Economic Development, and Asceticism

Today marks the 20th birthday of the Nintendo 64 (N64) gaming console. Don Reisinger offered a great tribute at Fortune: On this day in Japan 20 years ago, Nintendo introduced the gaming system, among the first consoles to create realistic-looking 3D worlds filled with monsters, soldiers, and blood. Continue Reading...
May 11, 2016

Understanding Trump: The Deal-Maker as Redistributionist

[Note: This is the second in an occasional series evaluating the remaining presidential candidates and their views on economics and liberty. You can find the first article here.] In the previous article in this series I explained that the key to understanding Donald Trump’s economic policies is the recognition that, for him, policy and principle are secondary to process. Continue Reading...
April 12, 2016

Lex Luthor, Capitalist Villain

In an earlier post I compared the political economy of superheroes in the DC and Marvel universes. And today I have a piece up at The Stream examining the figure of Lex Luthor, the crony capitalist villain featured in Batman v. Continue Reading...
October 05, 2015

John D. Rockefeller’s Special Gift to the World

Whether derided as a devil of modern industry or hailed as a saint of modern philanthropy, oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller remains a controversial figure. Although the reality of the man is surely complex, those who attack his legacy tend to indulge in more than a few historical errors and economic myths, painting him as a supreme symbol of all that is wrong with industrialization and capitalism. Continue Reading...
August 20, 2014

Every Market Form in a Single Chart

Reading through the German economist Walter Eucken’s work The Foundation of Economics (1951), I came across one of the most helpful charts for economic analysis I have yet to find. In it, Eucken gives every possible form of market in a single table: Eucken adds four qualifications that are important to keep in mind: “These forms of market are actual forms which have been or are to be found in actual economic life (often blended with one another, and existing alongside the forms of a centrally directed economy). Continue Reading...
August 07, 2013

What Distributists Get Wrong

Last week, we took a look at what distributists get right in terms of economics, through the eyes of David Deavel at Intercollegiate Review. Now, Deavel discusses where distributism goes off the rails in that same series. Continue Reading...
June 13, 2013

Peter Schweizer Talks Congressional Insider Trading

In his bestseller, Throw Them All Out, Peter Schweizer declares, “The Permanent Political Class has no sense of urgency to change because, for them, business is good.” Schweizer, who is interviewed in the latest issue of Religion & Liberty, appeared today on the Mike Huckabee radio show to talk congressional insider trading. Continue Reading...