Economic Policy News

The Biden administration on Wednesday released details of the first part of its latest enormous spending plan. Although President Joe Biden is promoting the plan as a way to create jobs through infrastructure projects, its combination of tax hikes and central planning would leave the nation poorer and more dysfunctional. Amazingly, this $2 trillion-plus in…

The media were flooded Monday with news that the Biden administration is working on a colossal new $3 trillion to $4 trillion spending plan. While full details are not available yet, the plan appears to be another left-wing grab bag of big-government proposals. Rather than stimulating the economy, it would stimulate bigger government while funneling…

Economic freedom helps to inhibit the spread of fake news, according to a recent academic paper featured in the European Journal of Information Systems. According to the study, titled “Impact of Mobile Connectivity and Freedom on Fake News Propensity During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Cross-Country Empirical Examination”:  [O]ur empirical analysis demonstrates the significant role of…

Although it has faltered, Chile continues to lead South America in having a free economy, according to the 2021 edition of The Heritage Foundation’s annual Index of Economic Freedom. As reported by The Wall Street Journal, Chile also leads South America in the race to achieve herd immunity from the COVID-19 pandemic.  Those two developments…

In the latest in a series of kidnappings (and even killings) of schoolchildren reported earlier by media outlets, including The Daily Signal, a criminal gang of more than 100 armed bandits invaded a boarding school in Zamfara, northwest Nigeria, on Feb. 26 and abducted as many as 300 innocent schoolgirls. No sooner had the government…

Last week, two important reports were released, shining a light on one of the major challenges facing America—excessive government spending that is causing the poor and declining fiscal health of the federal government. This reduces economic freedom and threatens prosperity, making it more difficult for families to live the American dream. In The Heritage Foundation’s…

Charles Payne of the Fox Business Network sat down with Jack Spencer, vice president of the Institute for Economic Freedom at The Heritage Foundation, to discuss the revealing—and alarming—key points from the 2021 Index of Economic Freedom at the index’s launch event Thursday. The index shows that the United States suffered a large setback in…

The year 2020 was extraordinary for the global economy, with slowing growth and economic turmoil caused and exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which engulfed the entire world. In the midst of the health crisis, perhaps not so unexpectedly, our free-market system was questioned yet again by some as a root cause of systemic economic woes…

The results of The Heritage Foundation’s 2021 edition of the Index of Economic Freedom will be announced soon. But here is a sneak peek: economic freedom in Argentina, which had registered considerable improvement during the four years of the center-right Macri government, has begun to decline (again) in the year since the Peronist Party returned…

Sure, you know that being an Uber driver is great for someone who wants to make their own hours. But did you know that many Americans are choosing freelance work because they need flexibility because of family or other responsibilities? Did you know that small businesses rely on independent contractors? Or that Americans who were…

Speaking on the 73rd Independence Day of Sri Lanka on Feb. 4, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa observed: “The foundation of our citizen-centric economic policy is that the true potential of the economy cannot be unleashed without economic freedom.” He further noted that “to achieve the government’s aims of eliminating poverty, providing equal opportunity for improvement of…

House Ways and Means Committee Democrats recently released their framework to “make our nation a more just and equitable place.” The goal of lifting more “people onto career ladders” and providing more robust economic opportunities for American families is admirable. But the committee’s framework simply expands tax programs that have for decades failed to meet…

President Donald Trump is right: There’s a lot of ridiculous gimmicks and wasteful projects in the new massive spending bill. And the good news is there’s something that Trump can do about it, even though he recently signed the huge COVID-19 stimulus and omnibus spending bill into law.  While signing the bill, the president released…

The world this week lost a great defender of economic freedom with the passing of the great American economist Walter E. Williams. He was 84. Williams’ legacy will be one of fighting for lasting liberty at every turn against those who would be dictators over their fellow man. As an economics professor at George Mason…

With the Thanksgiving season upon us, a group of scholars is meeting today to discuss the Mayflower Compact, in a webinar series honoring the 400th anniversary of the signing of this quintessential and seminal American document. Hosted by The Heritage Foundation and the Religious Liberty Institute, the concluding webinar examines the impact of the Mayflower…

One of the unexpected consequences of COVID-19 is it forced the U.S. government to reexamine how it does its job, including how it spends on national defense. Right now, Congress must give careful attention to the national defense budget, even as it faces increasing pressure to spend on domestic programs and on issues abroad. These…