A few weeks ago, UCal Berkeley Economics Professor Brad DeLong ran a post, The Vibe-Horsing Coal-&-Steam Revolution of the 1700s,1 remarking on the “Jevons paradox”—the observation of 19th century2 British economist William Jevons that technological improvements in the efficiency of steam engines increased their use to the extent that the demand for coal increased as…

If you read Reason magazine as often as I do—and I read it a lot, because it has lots of excellent articles—you’ve probably noticed a distinct fly in the ointment—the compulsive need of Reason folk to “explain” to you that everything “bad” that Trump does, well, the Democrats did it too—though I don’t remember Barack…

I’m currently reading Doom Loop, a book by Eswar Prasad, Tolani Senior Professor of Trade Policy and Professor of Economics at Cornell University, explaining why “globalism”, which only a short 25 years ago promised a world of unprecedented global progress and prosperity, has created its opposite, “anti-globalism”, a world of suspicion, oppression, and fear. So…

ChatGPT says it loves my new novel, Einstein. But is it telling, you know, “the truth”? As a seriously obscure novelist, I have always believed that the best advice you can give an incipient author of fiction is “write about what you know.” In my new novel, Einstein (available, naturally, from Amazon), I wrote about…