May 30, 2020 | Business, Politics
Writes Richard Salsman in The Hill: on why Fiscal-monetary ‘stimulus’ is depressive (26 May 2020):
What is the case for “stimulus”? Many economists believe public spending and money issuance create wealth or purchasing power. Not so. Our only means of obtaining real goods and services is from wealth creation — production. Under barter no one comes to market expecting to buy stuff without also offering stuff. A monetary economy does not alter this key principle.
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To see why “stimulus” truly depresses, consult the basics. The creation of public money and public debt is not the creation of wealth; it is not food, clothing, shelter, energy or the like. Even privately generated money and debt, which reflect the needs of trade and lengthy production chains, represent, facilitate and circulate wealth but are not themselves wealth. Meanwhile, the savings borrowed by governments are unavailable to productive enterprises, and when a government creates fiat money beyond what money holders demand, the money loses purchasing power, which boosts the cost of living. These are not roads to prosperity.
May 25, 2020 | Business, Politics
Steven Kates presents the Ludwig von Mises Memorial Lecture at the 2010 Austrian Scholars Conference.
Apr 22, 2020 | Business, Politics, Sci-Tech
Fact 1: The overwhelming majority of people do not have any significant risk of dying from COVID-19.
Fact 2: Protecting older, at-risk people eliminates hospital overcrowding.
Fact 3: Vital population immunity is prevented by total isolation policies, prolonging the problem.
Fact 4: People are dying because other medical care is not getting done due to hypothetical projections.
Fact 5: We have a clearly defined population at risk who can be protected with targeted measures.
After providing evidence for the above facts he goes on to conclude:
The appropriate policy, based on fundamental biology and the evidence already in hand, is to institute a more focused strategy like some outlined in the first place: Strictly protect the known vulnerable, self-isolate the mildly sick and open most workplaces and small businesses with some prudent large-group precautions. This would allow the essential socializing to generate immunity among those with minimal risk of serious consequence, while saving lives, preventing overcrowding of hospitals and limiting the enormous harms compounded by continued total isolation.
A pandemic does not alter the role of a government. For example, it can limit the freedom of those individuals who carry the virus for limited periods to protect others, whose right to life would be violated. This could involve testing, tracing contacts, and tracking. When governments are involved in operating health care systems, as they are in most mixed economies, they would isolate nursing home residents and other vulnerable people, increase hospital capacity, and set guidelines for physical distancing—as opposed to violating everybody’s right to liberty by locking down economies.
We need to learn to appreciate progress—both what we’ve already done, and why we can’t stop now. We need to tell the amazing story of progress: how comfort, safety, health, and luxury have become commonplace, and what a dramatic achievement that has been.
More recently, in the wake of the Covid-19 virus outbreak, we’ve seen unwarranted, unprecedented violations of all three realms of freedom in America – mandates to close businesses, edicts that people stay in their homes (“shelter in place,” akin to a nationwide house arrest of innocents presumed guilty), decrees against assembling (compelling “social distancing”), orders restricting access to gun shops, even the classification of some street protests (against the illiberal controls) as prohibited because a “non-essential” activity. We’ve yet to see challenges from the ACLU or court orders staying the rights violations. Why?
The lockdowns, whatever one thinks of them, were never sold to us as a way to eradicate the disease. They were sold as a way to “flatten the curve” so that the medical system didn’t become overwhelmed, leading to *unnecessary* deaths. […] We must open the economy as fast as we can. And we must do so while managing the disease as best we can. That includes selective isolation for the most vulnerable. (I have family members in this category…and, if it matters, they support re-opening the economy. They recognize that it would be immoral to demand that we sacrifice the whole country to reduce their odds of getting the disease.)
- Alex Epstein’s video “A pro-freedom approach to fighting COVID-19″: (Power Hour, April 15, 2020):
If you’re seeking to avoid COVID-19, the hand sanitizer gel you carry in a pocket or purse did not exist until the 1960s. If you start to show symptoms, the pulse oximeter that tests your blood oxygenation was not developed until the 1970s. If your case worsens, the mechanical ventilator that keeps you alive was invented in the 1950s—in fact, no form of artificial respiration was widely available until the “iron lung” used to treat polio patients in the 1930s. Even the modern emergency medical system did not exist until recently: if during the 1918 flu pandemic you became seriously ill, there was no 911 hotline to call, and any ambulance that showed up would likely have been a modified van or hearse, with no equipment or trained staff.
If you are a scientist at an academic institution currently working on a COVID-19 related project and in need of funding, we invite you to apply for a Fast Grant. Fast Grants are $10k to $500k and decisions are made in under 48 hours. If you wish to apply to grants for scientific or biomedical COVID-19 projects, please apply through FastGrants.org.
Apr 7, 2020 | Business, Politics
From “Key Medical Supplies Were Shipped From U.S. Manufacturers to Foreign Buyers, Records Show” (The Intercept):
Vessel manifests maintained by U.S. Customs and Border Protection and reviewed by The Intercept show a steady flow of the medical equipment needed to treat the coronavirus being shipped abroad as recently as March 17.
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Drive DeVilbiss Healthcare, a Pennsylvania-based health product firm that produces supplemental oxygen machines, sent at least three different shipments of respiratory equipment to Belgium in mid-February and early March. The total cargo included 14 containers weighing more than 55 tons.
Fifty-five tons!
On March 8, two tons of Vapotherm’s high-flow disposable patient circuit units, used for operating its respiratory aids, were loaded onto a container ship in the Port of Los Angeles. The shipment was sent to Kobe, Japan, for Japan Medicalnext Co., a health care distributor.
The records show dozens of other shipments of respirator equipment, medical garments, medical masks, oxygen concentrators, and ventilators sent abroad over the last two months.
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On February 28, a ship left New York for Hamburg, Germany, with about 1.5 tons of ventilator masks manufactured by Allied Healthcare Products, a health product business based in St. Louis. The masks are used for the company’s portable ventilator unit.
The reason?
The U.S. government has placed no restrictions on exports of medical supplies while continuing to impose financial penalties on the import of personal protective gear, protective goggles, pulse oximeters, hand sanitizer, and other medical products from China. On March 10 and 12, President Donald Trump temporarily lifted tariffs, in place since 2017, on some of these medical products.
Apr 2, 2020 | Business, Politics
Yaron Brook, in an excellent Twitter thread, makes an off the cuff outline of how he thinks a free-market would respond to the COVID-19 crisis:
In a truly capitalist society, here is how the market responds:
1. Health insurance companies monitor for health risks (they have an economic interest to do so).
2. Warn early — implement plans with hospitals, that have been developed well in advance.
3. Demand from hospitals for extra equipment, causes prices to go up quickly.
4. The market responds by bringing on new capacity quickly.
5. Groceries raise prices on high in-demand goods, thus reducing “hoarding” and assuring continued supply.
6. Hospitals (all private, and in a completely private market) activate emergency plans (which they have a profit-motive to have) for additional beds (in mothballed buildings, local hotels, or other facilities).
7. Private pharmaceutical companies and labs develop tests at the request of hospitals and clinics.
8. Private clinics start testing in mass.
9. Goverment’s job — to make sure those who are a threat to others, are isolated.
10. Private media and health experts, provide objective (non-political) advice to individuals and companies on how to deal, in the context of their own lives, with the pandemic.
11. Testing provides individuals and companies with the kind of information crucial to making rational decisions.
12. Private labs and pharma companies rush to innovate treatments and vaccines.
13. Private testing and certification organizations (“FDA” replacements) ramp up to approve test kits, treatments, and vaccines.
14. Business adjusts to peoples’ preferences for safety. Put in necessary protections and conveniences…
15. People who don’t follow the reasonable guidelines suffer social ostracism and left to suffer consequences.
16. Insurance contracts could be written in ways that say — if you want to be covered, behave…
Feel free to add — private market responses to pandemic…
You can read the original thread and the responses here.
Mar 30, 2020 | Business, Politics
The Battelle Corporation has a technology that can decontaminate face masks making them reusable — unfortunately, FDA regulations limited its use until today.
From “Battelle gets full approval for mask sterilization”/ Dayton Daily News:
The FDA gave full approval to Battelle to utilize new surgical mask sterilization technology, which can decontaminate up to 80,000 masks a day per unit.
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The FDA initially limited Battelle’s approval to 10,000 masks a day, drawing criticism from Gov. Mike DeWine and Lt. Gov. Jon Husted.
“The FDA’s decision to severely limit the use of this life-saving technology is nothing short of reckless,” DeWine said in a statement. “Battelle’s innovative technology has the capability to protect health care professionals and first responders in Ohio and across the country, but in this time of crisis, the FDA has decided not to support those who are risking their lives to save others.”
Added DeWine: “This is a matter of life and death. I am not only disappointed by this development, but I’m also stunned that the FDA would decline to do all it can to protect this country’s frontline workers in this serious time of need.”
For days running, DeWine has publicly pleaded with the FDA to issue an emergency waiver for the use of the new technology that could sterilize up to 160,000 personal protective face masks every day.
After this crisis is over, the power the FDA yields to halt innovation and progress needs to be abolished.
