Ukraine Hyperinflates
Steve H. Hanke
Since the New Year, Ukraine’s currency – the hryvnia – has collapsed, losing 51 percent of its value against the U.S. dollar. To put this rout into perspective, consider that the Russian ruble has only lost 8 percent against the greenback during the same period.
Like night follows day, the hryvnia’s meltdown has resulted in a surge of inflation. The last official Ukrainian year-over-year inflation rate is 28.5 percent. This rate was reported for January and is out of date. That said, the official inflation rate has consistently and massively understated Ukraine’s brutal inflation. At present, Ukra...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - February 25, 2015 Category: American Health Authors: Steve H. Hanke Source Type: blogs
Suing Governments for their Environmental Policy under International Law
Simon Lester
Some folks over at Heritage have a new Issues Brief in which they argue for including an Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) mechanism in the U.S.-EU trade deal being negotiated right now. In a nutshell, ISDS lets foreign investors sue host country governments in an international tribunal when they feel certain of their rights have been infringed.
I’ve been critical of ISDS. I do see the potential that such international rules have for protecting property rights, but I worry about other aspects of the rules. One issue is that these rules protect the rights only of foreign investors.&n...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - February 23, 2015 Category: American Health Authors: Simon Lester Source Type: blogs
The Libertarian Mind in the News
David Boaz
I’ve been busy talking up the libertarian moment, libertarian ideas, and The Libertarian Mind (buy it now, available everywhere) in person and in print lately. Here are a few recent examples.
My article on America’s libertarian roots in Sunday’s Philadelphia Inquirer:
Indeed, the principles of the Declaration are so closely associated with libertarianism that the Chinese edition of my previous book, Libertarianism: A Primer, features a cover photograph of the famous room in Independence Hall, complete with Windsor chairs and green tablecloths.
Libertarianism is the philosophy of free...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - February 19, 2015 Category: American Health Authors: David Boaz Source Type: blogs
Measuring Misery in Latin America 2014: More Dollarization, Please
Steve H. Hanke
In my misery index, I calculate a ranking for all countries where suitable data exist. My misery index — a simple sum of inflation, lending rates, and unemployment rates, minus year-on-year per capita GDP growth — is used to construct a ranking for 108 countries. The table below is a sub-index of all Latin American countries presented in the world misery index.
A higher score in the misery index means that the country, and its constituents, are more miserable. Indeed, this is a table where you do not want to be first.
Venezuela and Argentina, armed with aggressive socialist policies, end up the ...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - February 9, 2015 Category: American Health Authors: Steve H. Hanke Source Type: blogs
The Oil Price Plunge Won’t Cause Russia or Iran to Capitulate
Ted Galen Carpenter
The recent dramatic drop in global oil prices has significant geopolitical as well as economic implications. Consumers in the United States and other countries enjoy substantial savings, while marginal producers, both here and abroad, find their profit margins severely squeezed. As I discuss in an article at Aspenia Online, some of the oil-producing states that have been especially hard hit include Russia, Venezuela, and Iran. All of those countries are governed by regimes that are on bad terms with the United States, so there is a temptation among American political leaders and pundi...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - January 29, 2015 Category: American Health Authors: Ted Galen Carpenter Source Type: blogs
The World Misery Index: 108 Countries
Steve H. Hanke
Every country aims to lower inflation, unemployment, and lending rates, while increasing gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. Through a simple sum of the former three rates, minus year-on-year per capita GDP growth, I constructed a misery index that comprehensively ranks 108 countries based on “misery.”
Below the jump are the index scores for 2014. Countries not included in the table did not report satisfactory data for 2014.
The five most miserable countries in the world at the end of 2014 are, in order: Venezuela, Argentina, Syria, Ukraine, and Iran. In 2014, Argentina and Ukraine moved into the t...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - January 22, 2015 Category: American Health Authors: Steve H. Hanke Source Type: blogs
Too much going on at once
Cuba Cuba Cuba. No, Sen. Rubio, America will not "be less safe as a result of the president's change in policy" because dictators in Venezuela, Iran and North Korea will try to take advantage of the United States. That is probably the stupidest thing anybody has ever said. In the first place, neither Venezuela nor Iran have threatened the United States in any way, nor could they, nor could North Korea, nor could Cuba have done so at any time in its history. And how normalizing relations with Cuba has anything whatsoever to do with those other countries is inexplicable. Just completely idiotic. There is zero economic or n...
Source: Stayin' Alive - December 18, 2014 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
The moral high ground
(Alas, I can't link to the New York Times any more because they have retreated behind the pay wall. So what I am going to do serves them right -- lift a quote without a link. They can decide if their new policy is the right one.)It seems the hopey changey guy is going to sign a law that will impose sanctions on Venezuelan officials responsible for human rights violations, including violence against protesters. Here are the appalling crimes in the latter category:Interviews with protesters and other witnesses revealed an apparent pattern of abuses on the part of security forces, who frequently beat, kicked and threatened pr...
Source: Stayin' Alive - December 12, 2014 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
'Justice' à la Venezuelan
Juan Carlos Hidalgo
This week a Venezuelan judge indicted opposition leader María Corina Machado on flimsy charges of conspiracy to kill President Nicolás Maduro. If found guilty, she could spend up to 16 years in prison. Can she expect a fair trial from the Venezuelan judiciary?
Not at all, according to the findings of an investigation led by three Venezuelan lawyers and published in a new book, El TSJ al Servicio de la Revolución (“The Supreme Court at the Service of the Revolution”). According to their research, since 2005 Venezuela’s justice system has issued 45,474 sentences, but not once has it ruled agains...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - December 5, 2014 Category: American Health Authors: Juan Carlos Hidalgo Source Type: blogs
Oil Price Blues (Read: Dangers) for Some
Steve H. Hanke
As the price of crude oil continues its downward tumble towards $80 per barrel, I am reminded of a similar scenario from near the end of the Cold War in the 1980s. When Saudi Arabia announced in 1985 that protecting oil prices was no longer its main priority, oil production surged and prices fell off a cliff, briefly plunging below $10 per barrel, as I had correctly predicted.
Lower prices delivered a fatal blow to the Soviet economy, which ended up seeing $20 billion per year in oil revenues evaporate. The resulting fiscal shortfalls proved to be a dagger in the heart of the U.S.S.R.
On October 1st of this...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - October 16, 2014 Category: American Health Authors: Steve H. Hanke Source Type: blogs
Falling Oil Prices Put Producers Between a Rock and a Hard Place
Steve H. Hanke
Over the last few months, the price of Brent crude oil lost over 20% of its value, dropping below $90 just yesterday and hitting its lowest level in over two years. In consequence, oil producers will no longer be able to rely on oil revenues to pay their bills. The fiscal break-even price – a metric that determines the price per barrel of oil required for a nation to balance its budget at current levels of production – puts the problem into perspective.
Using data from Bloomberg and Deutsche Bank, I prepared a chart showing the break-even prices for the world’s major oil producers and the price on Bre...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - October 13, 2014 Category: American Health Authors: Steve H. Hanke Source Type: blogs
At a Minimum, Transatlantic Trade Negotiations Should Ditch Investor-State Provisions
Daniel J. Ikenson
Some exaggeration notwithstanding, Harold Meyerson, with whom the occasion to agree is rare, does a reasonably good job describing some of the pitfalls of the so-called Investor-State Dispute Settlement mechanism in his Washington Post column yesterday. ISDS has become a source of growing controversy, which threatens to derail the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations, which are reported to be floundering during the seventh “round” of talks taking place this week in Chevy Chase, Maryland.
“Under ISDS,” Meyerson writes, “foreign investors can sue a nation with which t...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - October 3, 2014 Category: American Health Authors: Daniel J. Ikenson Source Type: blogs
Venezuela: A Military Regime
Juan Carlos Hidalgo
Bloomberg has a story today on the many perks that the Venezuelan army enjoys vis-à-vis the downtrodden civilian population. Whereas a regular Venezuelan has to line up for hours to get basic goods (when they are available), officers enjoy privileged access to fully stocked supermarkets, new cars, housing, and many other benefits.
The obvious strategy of the Venezuelan government is to keep the armed forces happy in case it needs them to hold on to power. But the reality is far worse. In fact, Venezuela is now a military regime. Even though President Nicolás Maduro is a civilian, he is su...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - September 29, 2014 Category: American Health Authors: Juan Carlos Hidalgo Source Type: blogs
#WhyLiberty: Venezuela
Caleb O. Brown
Thousands of Venezuelans regularly protest Nicolás Maduro’s government. Juan Carlos Hidalgo, a Policy Analyst on Latin America at the Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity at the Cato Institute, recalls witnessing the struggle for freedom in Caracas.
“Why Liberty” is a short series of personal stories emphasizing the value of liberty. Feel free to make your own video telling your story using #WhyLiberty. And, of course, subscribe to us on YouTube. (Source: Cato-at-liberty)
Source: Cato-at-liberty - September 19, 2014 Category: American Health Authors: Caleb O. Brown Source Type: blogs
