Free Thoughts

Ryan Bourne and Diego Zuluaga come back to the show to talk about how fiscal and monetary policy are changing drastically to respond to COVID-19. We are operating in a world of radical uncertainty. We are still unsure of how many people have been infected by the novel coronavirus. Every uncertainty affects how the stock market responds. However, it is reasonable to expect the American economy to boom back strongly in 1-3 years.

How is the COVID-19 recession different than the 2007-2009 financial crisis? What industries are hurt the most by COVID-19? How do you define an economic recession? Is the market a discovery mechanism? Should individuals receive direct support from the government?

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Kevin Currie-Knight comes back to the show to discuss different methods of homeschooling and how parents are handling the education of their children during the coronavirus pandemic. Many homeschooling families recognize that children learn when the children are guiding the learning, but that cannot happen when a school is sending home material. The more choice kids have in their learning, the better the learning outcomes.

What is the difference between homeschooling and un-schooling? How has homeschooling changed since the 1830s? Should we force students to learn certain subjects or classics? Should students only be taught subjects that have value later in life?

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Radu Uszkai joins the show today to talk about if the case against intellectual property can be strengthened by appealing to the work of F.A. Hayek. Intellectual property is deeply rooted in our understanding of our own creativity. Intellectual property rights and copyright actually emerge as a result of creative revolutions. The copyright story of Mickey Mouse is probably the best-known. Throughout this episode they discuss the role of copyright in the movie industry, fashion industry, and more.

Is intellectual property actually property? What is Hayekian skepticism? What did Hayek think of copyright? Why are incentives important? What is the difference between plagiarism and copying? Is copyright protection necessary for creativity?

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Matt Ridley joins the show today to talk about his new book, How Innovation Works. Ridley describes innovation as the main event of the modern age. But innovation is still very hard for us as a society to wrap our heads around because it doesn’t just appear on its’ own. Ridley argues that we need to see innovation as an incremental, bottom-up, fortuitous process that happens to society as a direct result of the human habit of exchange.

How has innovation transformed public health? What is the difference between an invention and an innovation? Is innovation slowing down?

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Americans are far less likely to trust their institutions, and each other, today compared to decades past. This collapse in social and political trust arguably fuels our increasingly ferocious ideological conflicts and hardened partisanship.

What’s the basis for people to trust each other? How do you measure social trust? What is reflective equilibrium?

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Stephanie Slade joins the show to talk about her new cover story for Reason Magazine; Against the New Nationalism. Her piece starts by noting how Richard Lowry, the author of The Case for Nationalism, argues that there is no real difference between nationalism and patriotism. We discuss how conservative nationalists argue that we lost sight of how to be a moral people, and we need the government to get us back on track.

What is nationalism? Is nationalism patriotism? Are Americans proud of their country? What is the nationalism conservatism movement? What threat does nationalism pose?

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While we practice social-distancing during the coronavirus pandemic, Aaron and Trevor remind us that there’s something about politics itself that is harmful to us and makes us worse people. If you think the political debate is rancorous now, just imagine what it’ll be like when it determines even more of our lives, as we become more and more connected.

What effect does politics have on our lives? How has politics evolved? How do political parties pin people against each other? How do you engage in politics? Is politics bitter by nature?

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Julia Maskivker believes not only that we should vote, but that we must vote. Even when confronted with two unappealing candidates, or with ballot propositions whose effects we will barely feel, or with the fact that our single vote might never tip an election, we must vote.

Do we have a duty to vote or do we have a duty instead to vote well? What is the purpose of voting? What is voter fatigue?

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Democracy can be a good thing, but if forced into places and situations where it fits poorly, like a Thanksgiving dinner, then maybe we should rethink its limits. We discuss the nature and purpose of democracy and whether democratic politics is an end in itself or whether democracy exists for a purpose with Robert Talisse.

Is it possible to have too much democracy? Does too much democracy damage the very goals for which we have democracy in the first place? How has our partisanship seeped in to other areas of our lives?

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Entrepreneurs disrupt industries and throw equilibria out of whack, but where would the modern world be without entrepreneurs? The economics of innovation is particularly important to understand at a time when more politicians on both the right and the left are calling for industrial policy. Such proposals raise the question can and should entrepreneurship and innovation be planned? Arthur Diamond joins the show to talk about how good policy could actually encourage innovation.

How do innovators think about the world? Is there a way to predict what the next big innovation will be? Should we let innovators be free? Why did no one predict the creation of the internet?

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