Reasoning Right

Services such as highway infrastructure and public utilities are often owned by the government.  The government maintains a coercive monopoly over these sectors of the economy by barring private companies from entering the field or by regulating private companies to the extent that the companies are not free to act in their own self interest.  Some results of government controlled infrastructure include crumbling roads, traffic jams, and power shortages.   When these areas of the economy are government run and government owned, there is no incentive to improve services and innovation is rare.   The privatization of these sectors of the economy is a topic deserving of more attention.  This is especially true given the President's focus on renewing investment in 'public infrastructure' by rebuilding roads.  A recent article by John Stossel brings to light the many benefits of road privatization as well as the inefficiencies (and occassional deaths) that result from government control of infrastructure.  A great read.  Click here for the article.

On January 29, 2009, The Ayn Rand Center hosted a talk by BB&T chairman and CEO John Allison.  The talk focused on the true causes of the financial crisis and the government's misguided efforts to cure the crisis.  The lecture has recently been posted by ARC and can be found here. 

Conclusion from the lecture:  The government played a large role in causing this crisis; the government is making the crisis worse by intervening in the economy now.

Sweden is often hailed by many to be a socialist democratic mecca.  One of the features of Sweden's government is "universal" or "socialized" healthcare.   It's no secret that universal healthcare has been a dismal failure in all countries where it is instituted.  Sweden is no exception.  This new article brings to light some of the more dismal aspects of Sweden's particular brand of universal healthcare.  A great read.  Click here for the article.

The phrase "Don’t Be Evil" is Google Inc.’s corporate motto. The slogan was reportedly created by Paul Buchheit and Amit Patel (the creators of Gmail) who stated that the catch phrase is a "bit of a jab at a lot of the other companies, especially our competitors, who at the time, in our opinion, were kind of exploiting the users to some extent." Google has become a fierce competitor of Microsoft in the search engine market and web based email market. The new products that Google brings to the market place is convincing evidence that despite Microsoft’s size and strength, there is always room for new companies to competitively offer consumers new products which are cheaper, better, and more enjoyable to use. The only requirement for competitive success is to allow companies like Google and Microsoft the freedom to sell their own products on their own terms. It is hard to deny that Google has been a ‘good’ company by creating programs that are better than their competitors. However, Google has recently violated its motto by intervening as a third party in support of a European Union antitrust complaint against Microsoft. In supporting the European Union’s attempt to disallow Microsoft from selling its own products on its own terms (i.e. to bundle Internet Explorer with the Windows operating system), Google is engaging in anti-competitive behavior. Google is attempting to get an unfair advantage, not by creating better products, but through government pull and coercion.

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On February 25, 2009, President Barak Obama addressed both houses of Congress and the nation in the functional equivalent of a State of the Union Address. The President started off by reviewing the factors which caused the current economic crisis. He then outlined his plan for America and detailed the means necessary to realize his new vision. In looking back at history, he has blurred the facts, and in looking forward, he is flying blind. A clear analysis of the president’s speech shows that Obama’s explanation of the cause of the recession and his proposed solutions are full of contradictions, economic fallacies, and a false view of history.

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