This column by ACRU Policy Board Member and Professor of Economics Dr. Walter E. Williams was published March 19, 2014 on Townhall.com.

Many economists, politicians and pundits assert that median wages have stagnated since the 1970s. That’s a call for government to do something about it. But before we look at the error in their assertion, let’s work through an example that might shed a bit of light on the issue.

Suppose that you paid me a straight $20 an hour in 2004. Ten years later, I’m still earning $20 an hour, but in addition, now I’m receiving job perks such […]

This column by ACRU General Counsel Peter Ferrara was published on March 19, 2014 on Forbes.com.

Like all of President Obama’s ideas and enthusiasms, the minimum wage law is not a new idea. It was first adopted in 1938. It never has been the foundation of American prosperity, or even a good way to fight poverty. Indeed, it does more to increase poverty than reduce it.

Less than 3% of American workers are paid the minimum wage. These are not breadwinners supporting a family. Over half are between the ages of 16 and 24. Two-thirds (67%) of minimum wage earners work […]

This column by ACRU Policy Board Member and Professor of Economics Dr. Walter E. Williams was published March 12, 2014 on Townhall.com.

What kind of rules should govern our lives? I’d argue that the best rules are those that we’d be satisfied with if our very worst enemy were in charge of decision-making. The foundation for such rules was laid out by my mother. Let’s look at it.

My mother worked as a domestic servant. That meant that my younger sister and I often lunched at home by ourselves during our preteen years. Being bigger and stronger than my sister, I seldom divided the food […]

This column by ACRU General Counsel Peter Ferrara was published on March 12, 2014 on The American Spectator website.

On economic policy, President Obama has consistently and thoroughly followed just the opposite of everything Reagan did. And that is why he has consistently and thoroughly gotten the opposite of Reagan’s results.

Reagan slashed tax rates, with the top income tax rate reduced from 70% when he entered office to 28% when he left. (Federal tax revenues doubled during the 1980s.) Early in his first year, Reagan led Congress to cut federal spending by nearly 5%. Early in his first year, Obama […]

This column by ACRU Senior Fellow Robert Knight was published March 7, 2014 on The Washington Times website.

The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) says in a new report that the light-rail “Purple Line” expanding Washington, D.C.’s rail system further into the Maryland suburbs will cost $1 billion more than originally estimated.

Well, of course it will. Only suckers believe in initial estimates on any government project.

Remember the Big Dig? The Central Artery/Tunnel Project in Boston, on which construction began in 1991, was supposed to be completed in 1998 at a cost of $2.6 billion.

The price tag ballooned to a shocking $15 […]

This column by ACRU General Counsel Peter Ferrara was published on March 10, 2014 on Forbes.com.

In promoting his economic program in the early 1960s, President Kennedy told the American people,

“It is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high today, and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the tax rates….[A]n economy constrained by high tax rates will never produce enough revenue to balance the budget, just as it will never create enough jobs or enough profits.”

Kennedy added,

“Our true choice is not between tax reduction, […]