Archive for August 24th, 2010

Independent Institute Launches Government Cost Calculator at MyGovCost.org


Tuesday August 24th, 2010   •   Posted by Lindsay Boyd at 4:48pm PDT   •   0 Comments

Find Out How Much You’re Personally Paying for Government OAKLAND, Calif., August 30, 2010�The Congressional Budget Office expects our national debt to surpass $23 trillion by 2019. In fiscal year 2010 alone, federal spending will reach $3.5 trillion. The numbers are unprecedented and yet the experts are not optimistic that we will reestablish economic…
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Can the Leviathan Be Stopped or Slowed?


Tuesday August 24th, 2010   •   Posted by Robert Higgs at 4:44pm PDT   •   0 Comments

In a recent commentary titled �Diagnostics and Therapeutics in Political Economy,� I endeavored to show that an analytical understanding of past growth in the government’s size, scope, and power does not permit us to prescribe effective means of stopping or slowing this growth, particularly any simple silver bullet remedy, and I specifically disclaimed any…
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The Federal Bureaucracy


Tuesday August 24th, 2010   •   Posted by Robert Higgs at 4:26pm PDT   •   1 Comment

According to an analysis of federal payroll data by USA Today, the federal bureaucracy has flourished during the current recession. The number of Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14 percent to 19 percent of civil servants during the recession’s first 18 months and that’s before overtime pay and bonuses…
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Anatomy of the Current Recession


Tuesday August 24th, 2010   •   Posted by Robert Higgs at 4:22pm PDT   •   0 Comments

Not everyone has the stomach for perusing the national income and product accounts, but one who does can learn a great deal about what ails the present economy and about its prospects for returning to a healthier condition. (I draw the data I discuss here from Table B-2, Real Gross Domestic Product, 1960-2009, in…
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Defense Spending Is Much Greater than You Think


Tuesday August 24th, 2010   •   Posted by Robert Higgs at 4:16pm PDT   •   1 Comment

When President Obama presented his budget recently for fiscal year 2011, he proposed that the Pentagon’s outlays be increased by about 4.5 percent beyond its estimated outlays in fiscal 2010, to a total of almost $719 billion. Although many Americans regard this enormous sum as excessive, few appreciate that the total amount of all…
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