The world would be a much better place if economists, politicians and pundits had this line from Henry Hazlitt memorized: “What is harmful or disastrous to an individual must be equally harmful of disastrous to the collection of individuals that make up a nation.”
It’s arguably the most important line ever written in any economics book. Hazlitt (1894-1993) was making the essential point that an economy is not a living, breathing blob; rather it’s a collection of individuals.
The eminent journalist’s words form the basis of Popular Economics, my 2015 book, in which I use examples from sports, movies, television, music, and well-known businesses to explain the four basic governmental barriers to prosperity: taxes, regulation, tariffs, and floating money values. When an economy is broken down to the individual, what might seem opaque becomes very clear. Figure that no individual is made better off by a bigger income-tax bill; no individual is able to create more wealth if more and more work hours are spent complying with regulators; no individual is made wealthier if tariffs block the world’s talented from serving his needs; and no individual is able to amass more wealth if the dollar earned is constantly being devalued.
Read Full Article »
