Victor V. Claar's Blog

From NewsHour on PBS, the brilliant Paul Solman handicaps inflation numbers.

Watch Why Job Seekers, Employers Aren't Connecting on PBS. See more from PBS NewsHour.

Back in 2005, Paul Solman--economics editor for PBS's NewsHour--filed this marvelous three-part series about possible avenues for Social Security reform. If you want a thoughtful video introduction to the heart of the problem, there really is no better resource of which I am aware.

The three segments examined each of the following possible alternatives:


1) Raising the retirement age
2) Lifting the cap on payroll taxes
3) Reducing retirement benefits

If you are a current undergraduate student, I hope you will join me, fellow authors Bryan Caplan and Jason Brennan, and host and blogger for Forbes Art Carden for our IHS Weekend Exploring Liberty at Rhodes College in Memphis from Friday, Feb. 24, at 3 pm until Sunday, Feb 26, at 3 pm.

There is no cost to attend. All materials, meals, and snacks are provided at the seminar. Participants must arrange their own housing. Visit this link for a list of area hotels; say that you are visiting Rhodes and you should get some kind of discount.

Follow this link for more info and to apply. Deadline to apply is Friday, Feb. 17.

Great example of how a price spike in one good can cause the supply curve of another good to shift left.

Watch the latest video at video.foxbusiness.com

This does not bode well for the future:

From the wonderful Paul Solman and PBS's NEWSHOUR, a tour of frictional, structural, and cyclical unemployment in the current economy. And here is a direct link just in case.


Watch the full episode. See more PBS NewsHour.

The April 9 issue of WORLD magazine includes an interview with me:

Q&A
Political clunkersWe should 'treat people as people,' says economist Victor Claar, and U.S. trade restrictions fail that test | Marvin Olasky[image error]Guy Lyons/Genesis I asked economics professor Victor Claar (Henderson State University) about . . . ways we can help the poor internationally. Claar co-authored Economics in Christian Perspective (IVP, 2007) and wrote Fair Trade? Its Prospects as a Poverty Solution (Acton Institute, 2010). He earned his Ph.D. at West Virginia University and taught for nine years at Hope College in Michigan.

As a Christian economist, what do you like about markets? Markets can do tremendous good—they lift the poor out of poverty in far more effective ways than people can imagine or arrange otherwise. Markets are phenomenal in their ability to take resources and reallocate them from less-valued uses to more-valued uses.

How does the growth of a worldwide market help the poor internationally—and sometimes hurt Americans?

(Continue reading) 

From Michael Hicks, writing for the Indiana Economic Digest:

There is a certain poignant irony in the U.S. Census release of 2010 poverty statistics this Christmas week. It reminds us that, behind the green eyeshades of professional data collectors, the folks at the Census have an acute marketing sense.

The Gospel of Luke tells us that Mary and Joseph traveled to their familial birthplace as part of a census. The details and timing of the Roman census are hazy, but the intent of these counts was to levy taxes for Rome. This is a rich story and serves as a high point of the New Testament's beautifully subversive backdrop of freedom from tyranny. Unlike the Roman census of Quirinius, the modern U.S. Census affects the distribution, not collection of tax dollars. It is understandably a bit more welcomed.

Among the first of the big Census releases (that will continue for years) are local poverty rates for 2010. These are widely reported, but what do the data tell us? The sad truth is almost nothing of consequence. Here's why: (More)

(Hat-tip: My mom)

Cecil Bohanon, writing for the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel:

When I was 12 years old, the Youth of First Christian Church had a picnic at Honor Heights Park in Muskogee, Okla. The good ladies of the church brought loads of potato salad, baked beans and coleslaw, but every child knew the real action was in the sack lunch Mom had packed with their favorite delight. Our mom had fried some chicken.

That was a real treat for us as she opposed fried food on general principle long before such health concerns were fashionable. I had the breast pieces, my younger brother, Robert, got the drumsticks, and sister Susan got the thigh pieces.

Just before the prayer was to be given, the Rev. Wilbanks made an admonition that went something like this: You young folks should not be greedily holding on to your own sack lunches; rather you should empty your sacks and contribute the contents to the common table — after all, sharing was the Christian way.

I was horrified. Nonetheless, along with all the other children, I pliantly obeyed the minister and surrendered my lunch. We then all bowed our heads in prayer and I did something I had never done — I impiously opened my eyes and slowly edged toward the picnic table. . . . (More)

(Hat-tip: My mom)