Eric Rasmusen’s Weblog

Professor Lederman did a useful follow-up of the topic of our law-and-econ
lunch last week, which was the transaction cost of taxation. Here are some
facts:

The IRS budget is around $10 billion,

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-utl/budget-brief-05.pdf.

IRS collected nearly $2 trillion in revenue in 2003:

http://www.irs.gov/irs/article/0,,id=98141,00.html.

IRS reports that it costs taxpayers 48 cents per $100 collected:

http://www.irs.gov/irs/article/0,,id=98141,00.html. The site doesn’t say,
on the front page, what this means. I think it means the IRS’s budget cost, 10
billion divided by 2000 billion dollars. Taxpayer costs and allocative
distortion would be much higher.

IRS Data Books for 2001-2003, which contain a variety of interesting
statistics, are available at

http://www.irs.gov/taxstats/article/0,,id=102174,00.html.

From what Professor Thomas Smith says, Professor Bainbridge’s UCLA conference on corporate law was a great success, with interesting papers and a crowd of interesting and diverse people like Hart and Presser. Why wasn’t I invited? (maybe because I’ve never written a paper on corporate law and don’t even have any related papers in progress.) But I can see some of the papers at ALEA in New York in May, most likely.

In his blog Bainbridge says:… (more…)

David Frum has a good piece on Transatlantic relations:

There is a tendency to assume that everything that happens in the transatlantic relationship happens because of America: that it is always America that acts and Europe that reacts . This assumption no longer holds in the post-cold war world. It is European leaders, not American ones, who are loosening transatlantic ties, and as much as this saddens Americans, there is little they can do about it.

Ronald J. Sider’s 2004 book, The Scandal of the Evangelical Conscience, sounds interesting. The book’s theme is that most nominal Christians (a large proportion of the American population– and about 40% say they are “born again”) do not live according to their purported beliefs. It is excerpted here, and I’ve excerpted the excerpt at length, dropping footnotes and some formatting. … (more…)

As I wrote a couple of days ago, the Washington Post attacked writer Maggie Gallagher. She has written in support of Bush’s education policy, and she has also, separately, been employed by the government to write reports. The Post insinuated that her case was like that of Armstrong Williams, who was paid by the government covertly to advocate the Department of Education’s views.

Now Fred Hiatt, who oversees editorials and op-eds at the Washington Post, has just written
an op-ed on the Maggie Gallagher affair. I find it unsatisfactory. While it clearly states the situation, there are three problems. First, it does not apologize for the misleading nature of the original article. Second, it essentially repeats, more clearly, the attack on freelance, independent journalists who do work for the government (or anybody else). Third, it is hypocritical. Here’s what he says,…
(more…)

James Lileks has a
good post on a lazy day with his 4-year-old daughter.

Professor
Bainbridge makes a good observation on the AARP as a liberal front, rather than just another special-interest group:

…just one more liberal special interest group, albeit a particularly well
[camouflaged] and effective one (using those discounts to pull in seniors who
probably vote red). The latest example: We learn from "http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6853086/site/newsweek/"> an Eleanor Clift column
(of all things) that the AARP quietly has joined up with the Leadership
Conference on Civil Rights to oppose President Bush’s judicial nominees. So why
would a loyal (more or less) Republican like me join one of the worst of those
left-liberal special interest organizations of which the Democrat Party is a
wholly-owned subsidiary?

Human Events
tells us that
in Australia the law considers it “religious vilification”, a criminal offense,
to quote the parts of the Koran liberals consider it impolite to mention:
(more…)

It’s interesting how the Mainstream Media still retains its power to lie
successfully even to conservative weblogs and politicians who should know
better than to believe everything they read in the newspapers.
Via Instapundit and
"http://www.anklebitingpundits.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=
939&mode=nested&order=0&thold=0">Anklebitingpundits, I found a
yahoo story on the Maggia
Gallagher affair. She is falsely accused of accepting money to promote
government programs in her journalism. What actually happened is that she is a
journalist who has done contract work for the government to write particular
reports– all clearly labelled as coming from the government. In fact, it turns
out that part of the money was from the *Clinton* Administration:…
(more…)

Condoleeza Rice has been confirmed as Secretary as State by a vote of 85 to 13,
but that is the closest vote in the past 70 years (at least) for a Secretary of
State. I take this as yet another sign of how partisan the Democrats have
become, since
the closeness is entirely up to them. Nobody can say that the Republicans were
this partisan in voting on confirmations during the Clinton or Carter
administrations– nor were the Democrats in previous administrations. As the

AP says,

Although Rice was assured of confirmation, she got the most “no” votes since
World War II. Seven senators voted against Henry Kissinger and six each against
Dean Acheson and Alexander Haig….

(more…)

Here is the famous passage from Adam Smith’s
Wealth of Nations
on “the invisible hand” ( B.IV, Ch.2, Of Restraints upon the
Importation from Foreign Countries):

As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he
can both to employ his capital in the support of domestic
industry, and so to direct that industry that its produce
may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily
labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great
as he can . He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote
the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it.
By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign
industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing
that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the
greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in
this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand color=red>to
promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it
always the worse for the society that it was no part of it.
By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of
the society more effectually than when he really intends to
promote it. I have never known much good done by those who
affected to trade for the public good. It is an affectation,
indeed, not very common among merchants, and very few words
need be employed in dissuading them from it.