Blog

July 15, 2020

Polish Minority Rights and the European Union

Polish president, Andrzej Duda, and his close political ally, the Law and Justice Party, PiS, have not been shy of controversies during this last political term in power. After infringing on the rule of law and going against EU values, the latest controversy ahead of the Sunday election has been their marginalization of the LGBT community.
July 14, 2020

An Open Letter on the EU Budget

The negotiations on the European Union’s multi-annual financial perspective for 2021-2027 are underway. The European Commission’s recently updated budget proposal with suggested measures regarding the COVID-19 health and economic crisis and the recovery of the EU economy proposes only minor changes to the earlier version despite the extraordinary circumstances related to the pandemic and the increased need to use scarce taxpayers’ money in the most effective way possible.
July 1, 2020

“Next Generation EU” Spending Plan: Towards Strengthening or Weakening the EU in the Long Run?

While the media, right and left-wing parties and the average newspaper reader celebrate in anticipation of “helicopter money” from Brussels, or otherwise the so-called “Next Generation EU”, classical liberals wonder where all this money will come from while worrying about the potential impact on future generations.
June 25, 2020

Do Low Emissions Zones Really Work?

At the moment, the general sense of alarm caused by the supposed consequences of climate change is something that is shared by all Western societies. In order to tackle these consequences, various measures have been taken, amongst them the restriction of traffic.
June 23, 2020

The Issue at Stake Was Not to Choose Between Lives and the Economy

We often hear that managing a crisis like coronavirus depends on societal choices. The choice would be to save lives or economies. Health and economic data show that reality is much more complex than this simplification of the dilemma. Some countries have managed to accommodate both. Others, like France, have registered both a high mortality rate and a significant economic setback.
June 19, 2020

The Fake American Stimulation: an Economic Analysis of Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (Cares) Act

We almost pity American federal and state elected officials for having to deal with the situation caused by COVID-19. Overnight, social media users have become self-proclaimed epidemiologists, but it remains difficult to judge whether the measures taken by states and the federal government are too little too late or the right response to a health crisis. In some ways, it is tempting to favour the federal responses to the economic crisis as the circumstances are unlike those of previous crises.
June 17, 2020

Vaccine: We Must Change Our Absurd Rules Instead of Castigating Sanofi

Excessively high taxes on production, exceedingly slow authorizations for market launch, and an overbearing bureaucracy. France is ensuring that innovation, especially regarding pharmaceuticals, happens outside of its borders. Opinion piece by Cécile Philippe, president of the Economic Institute Molinari, published in Les Echos.