Episode 232: Protectionism vs. Free Enterprise

The Biden administration spent $42 billion of taxpayer funds to bring broadband access to rural America, and people are shocked, shocked, that nothing has been done. As people on both sides of the aisle scream for government to “do more,” perhaps there is a lesson in this failure to create connectivity, and perhaps that lesson ought to be that incentives and knowledge matter.Show notes:https://x.com/geiger_capital/status/1905591976876990670?s=61https://www.ntia.gov/45-year-anniversary

The media may have obsessed over the extravagant Jeff Bezos wedding in Venice last weekend, but most regular people with jobs and a family probably couldn’t care less. But in this week’s episode, David takes note of who does seem to care about such things, and what principles can be learned from the whole affair that impact our understanding of economics in the 21st century. This is a seriously contrarian episode of the Capital Record!

David walks through the new Barry Diller autobiography and extracts some key business lessons that speak to our own objectives here on the Capital Record. Barry may have been a Hollywood and media industry giant, and he may not care much for all of our ideological commitments, but he has a lot to offer in this week’s episode.Show Notes:"Business Lessons from the New Barry Diller Book"

The YIMBY Movement Is for Conservatives, TooAbundant Housing Creates Abundant Opportunities

Does prosperity make for a good life? If not, does it stand to reason that prosperity works against a good life? Why is this issue so problematic for people still today, when the answers embedded in the alleged tension were so apparent to men and women of wisdom so long ago? In this foundational episode, David discusses the recipe for the good life, where prosperity fits in, where it does not, and how stupidity can work to undermine both prosperity, and the good life so many claim to aspire to.

Is the U.S. bond market rejecting the fiscal state of the country? Is it declaring doom and gloom? Is it begging us not to do this “big, beautiful bill”? Or, is the fiscal state of the country deeply troubled? Is the new bill a big disappointment, but the bond market is saying no such thing (for reasons you deserve to understand)? In this very important Capital Record, David makes the argument that those wrongly declaring some form of bond market revolt are hurting the cause of fiscal reform, undermining credibility, and making it harder for the real needs we have to be addressed. This rejection of crying wolf comes at a very important time for this woefully managed country!

Financial innovations are demonized all the time, and perhaps David should be grateful because a low regard for capital markets is what motivated the creation of this podcast. But today he looks at SPACs and the criticisms of them as an example of how fallacious defense of central planning works. He makes the case that protection against fraud is one thing, but protection against loss is another. And ultimately, he makes the case that a system of robust financial markets has gains and losses, and that is a good thing.

There was a time conservatives all knew this, but the new right's fatal flaw is not just in the application -- the perpetual desire for more state intervention -- but rather in the very nature of things that they get wrong. Markets are not created by the state, but rather by voluntary, organic human interaction. David unpacks the relevance of this basic creational, economic, and yes, moral message, in today’s Capital Record.

Populism seems to be the driving force of the new right’s economic philosophy. The new right has said that they want to take on “libertarian” economics and “free market orthodoxy.” Others have said that “libertarian economics is the same thing as conservative economics” (i.e., laissez-faire, low tax, low regulation, etc.). David suggests the need of the hour is not just more precise definitions, but a truly robust understanding of conservative economics -- one that goes where libertarianism didn’t, and goes where populism simply can’t.

David takes on the idea that protectionism and globalization are chief rivals, and instead suggests that the chief rival of protectionism is free enterprise itself. He critiques Joe Nocera’s recent Free Press article suggesting that the protectionists have been vindicated, and instead suggests that the entire protectionist agenda is essentially the plight of the central planner. A careful critique of the tariff dogma, combined with a non-revisionist view of what has transpired in trade and culture over the last few decades!