Yesterday, I spoke against Clause 35 and schedules 15 to 17 of the Finance Bill 2013. They introduce tax relief for “high-end” television production (that is, posh drama and comedy) and video games development. They’re industries I’d like to see flourish but not by granting special privileges. It’s special privilege which is […]
Read MorePost Tagged with: "Liberalism"
Lloyd George’s liberalism
This quote by Lloyd George has been suggested to me. It’s from “Carving the Last Few Columns out of the Gladstonian Quarry: The Liberal Leaders and the Mantle of Gladstone, 1898–1929”, in David Bebbington and Roger Swift (eds.), Gladstone Centenary Essays, p 253. The doctrine of Liberalism is a doctrine that […]
Read MoreBad ideas that never die: a Parliament of special interests
The Times is running two letters under the heading, Should the Upper House be a Senate? (£). The first letter calls for a federal senate with equal representation for each nation of the UK. (Quite why the smaller nations should be disproportionately powerful, I do not know.) The second calls for […]
Read MoreThree political economies debated in Parliament
Last week, I chaired what turned out to be a passionate, courageous and grounded debate between three intellectuals from each point of the political triangle: conservative, classical liberal and social democrat. Dr Mark Pennington set out the inescapable reality of imperfect knowledge and incomplete rationality in human actors in defence […]
Read MoreRobust Political Economy and Realistic Idealism « Pileus
Via Robust Political Economy and Realistic Idealism « Pileus: What criterion should we use to evaluate political theories and the institutions they advocate? In my book Robust Political Economy, I argue that it is the criterion of ‘robustness’. Institutions that meet this criterion are those best placed to cope with fundamental […]
Read MoreThought for the day – liberalism, as classically understood
The program of liberalism, therefore, if condensed into a single word, would have to read: property, that is, private ownership of the means of production… All the other demands of liberalism result from his fundamental demand. Via the Ludwig von Mises Institute. Over lunch today, I very much enjoyed setting […]
Read MoreMark Prisk MP, Hayek and Mises
Via Business Minister Mark Prisk wants to strip away the red tape – Telegraph: Friedrich von Hayek is a controversial choice as a pin-up. But a signed pamphlet that the Austrian-born economist wrote in 1980 entitled “Full employment at any price” is proudly framed on Business Minister Mark Prisk’s wall. […]
Read MoreBastiat – The State
This post originally appeared at The Cobden Centre. In the course of things, I had cause to quote Bastiat, a French classical liberal theorist, political economist, and member of the French assembly: “The state is the great fiction by which everyone seeks to live at the expense of everyone else.” […]
Read MoreD-day Commemoration
On a grey and showery day, skydivers at Weston on the Green commemorated D-day, not by skydiving, but by jumping static line at what for us is a low level: 3500ft. It makes you think. D-day Commemoration – Dornier G92, originally uploaded by stevenjbaker. Sport parachuting is relatively low risk, […]
Read MoreThe Apostle of Free Trade: Richard Cobden
I just finished Gowing’s 1885 biography of Richard Cobden, whose doctrine was that free trade would lead to world peace through interdependence and mutual cooperation. Cobden was a leader of the Anti-Corn-Law League — a substantial feat of political agitation — which was established to oppose protectionist measures on corn […]
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