Are business people more corrupt than those in government? Hollywood loves to portray those in business as the baddies and those in government as the good guys. Exhibit A is the new movie, “The Wolf of Wall Street,” the largely true story of con man Jordan Belfort....

The struggle between the productive and the destructive never ends. The productive are those who add more value and wealth than they consume, and the destructive are those who destroy more value and wealth than they create. Will 2014 be a year of production or...

THE MAP AND THE TERRITORY: RISK, HUMAN NATURE, AND THE FUTURE OF FORECASTING By Alan Greenspan Penguin Press, $36, 388 pages Alan Greenspan began his career in economics as an analyst and forecaster. In his new book "The Map and the Territory," Mr. Greenspan presents...

New Year's resolutions are difficult to keep. That is why I find it easier to make them for others, rather than myself, as part of my other-people improvement program. The country would not be on the road to ruin if those in government would follow the New Year's...

If you think things are bad, you might be consoled in knowing that most things for most people on the globe were never better than in 2013. The good news is that most people are living longer with more real income and more security than they did a year ago, a decade...

Only 12 percent of likely U.S. voters favor a federal budget that increases government spending, but that's just what the bipartisan budget deal passed by the House late [last] week does. It restores billions cut by the sequester on March 30 and puts off potential...

Last week, President Obama said that “income inequality” is the major problem that his administration would focus on for the remainder of his term. He proposed increasing the minimum wage as a way to solve this issue. The president’s statement is a perfect example of...

Did you ever buy a game or device for which the rule book or instruction manual was so thick and detailed that you were not able to comprehend it in a reasonable period of time, so you either discarded or failed to use the product? Have you noticed that many...

If you have ever been before a judge for any reason, did you think about whether the judge was appointed by a Democrat or a Republican? Probably not. People expect judges, regardless of political leanings, to be fair and competent — and for the most part, this...

"I wouldn't start here if I were you," is the punch line of an old Irish joke, which monetary scholar Kevin Dowd cites to illustrate the deeper and deeper hole the Federal Reserve is getting us into. Mr. Dowd, in a paper delivered last week at the Cato Institute's...

What do you think the minimum wage per hour should be? How did you come up with that number? The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour, and the Obama administration proposed raising it to $10.10 per hour last Thursday. Last week, the voters in New Jersey passed a...

Do you think the government is too big, taxes too much and regulates your lives more than it should? Polls consistently show that most Americans think there is too much government. Nevertheless, those in the majority who say they want smaller government continue to...

The Obama administration has performed the unique trick of alienating the majority of our most important allies, while at the same time causing America to be viewed as a patsy by its enemies. The situation is bound to get worse now that the administration has taken...

If you were a U.S. National Park Service ranger, would you have kept disabled World War II veterans from going to their privately funded, open-air memorial in Washington? A congressman confronted a park ranger and told her she should be "ashamed." The congressman has...

The International Monetary Fund announced this past week that it expects world GDP growth to be only 2.9 percent this year. This is below the 3.2 percent in 2012, which was below the 30-year average of about 3.6 percent, and far below the one-of-the-best recent...

“There is nothing left to cut,” said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi last week when referring to the federal budget. Again, she displayed a complete disconnect with reality — a disconnect reinforced by all those other fantasyland souls who make her their leader. As...

This week, the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is slated to release its fourth report since 1990. Leaked copies indicate an admission that there has been no global warming for the past 16 years, but the report will also increase its...

Leaders who cannot see beyond Stage One often cause great harm. Unfortunately for the United States and the world, President Obama continues to exhibit a strange naivete and a lack of wisdom about domestic and foreign problems — Syria just being the latest example....