My Weekly Reading and Viewing for August 24, 2025

Are the BLS and Other Government Statistical Agencies Partisan? Here’s What My Research Found

by Vincent Geloso, The Daily Economy, August 18, 2025.

Excerpt:

There is little to substantiate the claim that the BLS produces low-quality data. The BLS (and every other statistical agency) frequently issues preliminary reports from surveys it conducts.

As such, revisions are common. How big are those revisions? Pretty small!

The graph below (courtesy of my co-author Gary Wagner at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette) shows error rates in monthly payroll employment estimates. It plots the percentage difference between the initial and final estimates. On this graph, a positive value means the initial estimate was lower than the final one. As can be seen, the errors (since 2000) are generally between ±0.5 percent. Most of the time (more than 90 percent), it’s within ±0.25 percent. On a pure absolute benchmark, this is not bad. In fact, if anything, the errors are getting smaller relative to the early period.

Why Collectivism Is Surging

by Paul Mueller, Law & Liberty, August 19, 2025.

Excerpt:

Collectivism also seems to answer many people’s cultural insecurities. On the political left, many wealthy, educated people feel deeply uneasy about their success and blessings, which they label “privilege.” And others, who have not done so well economically and are saddled with five, sometimes six, figure debt from their college years, resent the hand they were dealt and how they have played it. Collective government programs of welfare, redistribution, and rent control look like appealing solutions.

The political right has different cultural insecurities. Many worry about declining labor force participation among working-age men, about the opioid crisis, about falling birth rates and falling family formation, about declining manufacturing employment, and about reduced national defense capabilities. They suggest a naïve free trade, free market, and limited government philosophy allowed corporations to wipe out communities and their corresponding civic institutions, especially in middle America.

D.C. Residents Are Right To Protest Unconstitutional Police Roadblocks

by C.J. Ciaramella, Reason, August 15, 2025.

Excerpt:

NBC News and other outlets reported that more than 100 protesters turned out on Wednesday night to heckle federal law enforcement at a checkpoint on 14th Street Northwest and warn drivers of the police ahead.

And good for them.

Leaving aside the dubious overall legality of the White House’s takeover—the D.C. attorney general filed a lawsuit over that issue Friday—the use of such generalized roadblocks is obnoxious, impinges on Americans’ traditional freedom to travel, and is unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment’s protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.

Deregulate the Remittance Industry

by Jeffrey Miron, Cato at Liberty, August 20, 2025.

Excerpts:

Remittance regulations force money service providers to act as law enforcement, collecting detailed personal data, performing extensive customer screenings to bar sanctioned individuals, obtaining licenses in both sending and receiving countries, and hiring additional compliance personnel. US financial institutions spent $46 billion in 2022 on compliance.

And:

Not only does this regulatory regime impose costs on consumers, but it also decreases competition. Due to regulatory requirements, entry into the remittance market is difficult, so the number of operators is small. This often results in a nearly oligopolistic market, including major banks with pricing and markup power.

Georgia Woman Could Lose $30,000 After Local Government Denies Her Permit To Open Hair Salon

by Tosin Akintola, Reason, August 21, 2025.

Excerpt:

When Khalilah Few opened her salon, Creative Crowns Collective, in 2023, she didn’t think her business savvy would put her at odds with the local government. But two years later, she now finds herself in a legal battle with Clayton County, Georgia.

After outgrowing her original studio space, Few signed a two-year lease for a new salon housed in an old barbershop in Jonesboro, a city in Clayton County, in March. She invested over $30,000 into the property and applied for a Conditional Use Permit (CUP) in April to open her salon. Despite meeting the legal requirements for a permit [sic: misplaced modifier in original], the Clayton County Zoning Advisory Board and the Board of Commissioners denied Few’s application in July.

Fixing Higher Ed: The Bailey-Caplan Convo

by Bryan Caplan, betonit, August 22, 2025.

Excerpt:

Last month, Michael Bailey interviewed me on higher education, focusing on my most controversial views. Here’s his list of questions:

1. Although I want to focus attention on what in higher education is worth saving, let’s begin by discussing what is wrong. Just this week you cosigned what I believe is an important statement from the Manhattan Institute, “The Manhattan Statement on Higher Education.” Can you tell us more about that statement? Like how did it happen, and what are its main points?

2. The statement pinpointed two recent crises that revealed big problems: the 2020 Summer of George Floyd and the past two years of pro-Palestinian protests. To what extent do you think that universities have declined, and when did this happen?

DRH Note: Bryan Caplan is on fire. He’s at his scintillating best.

Postscript: This is a longer list of highlights than usual. The reason is that it’s the last “highlight reel” I’m doing. I’ll explain in a blog post tomorrow.

Are the BLS and Other Government Statistical Agencies Partisan? Here’s What My Research Found by Vincent Geloso, The Daily Economy, August 18, 2025. Excerpt: There is little to substantiate the claim that the BLS produces low-quality data. The BLS (and every other statistical agency) frequently issues ...

In 1975, New York City’s government ran out of money. “On the simplest level” journalist Martin Mayer wrote, “the story of New York’s financial collapse is the tale of a Ponzi game in municipal paper - the regular and inevitably increasing issuance of notes to be paid off not by the future taxes of revenue...

In his 1992 article "Congress is a 'They,' not an 'It': Legislative Intent as Oxymoron" (International Review of Law and Economics 12 (2)), Harvard University political scientist Kenneth Shepsle opens: An oxymoron is a two-word contradiction. The claim of this brief paper is that legislative intent, along with milit...

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My Weekly Reading and Viewing for August 24, 2025

Are the BLS and Other Government Statistical Agencies Partisan? Here’s What My Research Found

by Vincent Geloso, The Daily Economy, August 18, 2025.

Excerpt:

There is little to substantiate the claim that the BLS produces low-quality data. The BLS (and every other statistical agency) frequently issues preliminary reports from surveys it conducts.

As such, revisions are common. How big are those revisions? Pretty small!

The graph below (courtesy of my co-author Gary Wagner at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette) shows error rates in monthly payroll employment estimates. It plots the percentage difference between the initial and final estimates. On this graph, a positive value means the initial estimate was lower than the final one. As can be seen, the errors (since 2000) are generally between ±0.5 percent. Most of the time (more than 90 percent), it’s within ±0.25 percent. On a pure absolute benchmark, this is not bad. In fact, if anything, the errors are getting smaller relative to the early period.

Why Collectivism Is Surging

by Paul Mueller, Law & Liberty, August 19, 2025.

Excerpt:

Collectivism also seems to answer many people’s cultural insecurities. On the political left, many wealthy, educated people feel deeply uneasy about their success and blessings, which they label “privilege.” And others, who have not done so well economically and are saddled with five, sometimes six, figure debt from their college years, resent the hand they were dealt and how they have played it. Collective government programs of welfare, redistribution, and rent control look like appealing solutions.

The political right has different cultural insecurities. Many worry about declining labor force participation among working-age men, about the opioid crisis, about falling birth rates and falling family formation, about declining manufacturing employment, and about reduced national defense capabilities. They suggest a naïve free trade, free market, and limited government philosophy allowed corporations to wipe out communities and their corresponding civic institutions, especially in middle America.

D.C. Residents Are Right To Protest Unconstitutional Police Roadblocks

by C.J. Ciaramella, Reason, August 15, 2025.

Excerpt:

NBC News and other outlets reported that more than 100 protesters turned out on Wednesday night to heckle federal law enforcement at a checkpoint on 14th Street Northwest and warn drivers of the police ahead.

And good for them.

Leaving aside the dubious overall legality of the White House’s takeover—the D.C. attorney general filed a lawsuit over that issue Friday—the use of such generalized roadblocks is obnoxious, impinges on Americans’ traditional freedom to travel, and is unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment’s protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.

Deregulate the Remittance Industry

by Jeffrey Miron, Cato at Liberty, August 20, 2025.

Excerpts:

Remittance regulations force money service providers to act as law enforcement, collecting detailed personal data, performing extensive customer screenings to bar sanctioned individuals, obtaining licenses in both sending and receiving countries, and hiring additional compliance personnel. US financial institutions spent $46 billion in 2022 on compliance.

And:

Not only does this regulatory regime impose costs on consumers, but it also decreases competition. Due to regulatory requirements, entry into the remittance market is difficult, so the number of operators is small. This often results in a nearly oligopolistic market, including major banks with pricing and markup power.

Georgia Woman Could Lose $30,000 After Local Government Denies Her Permit To Open Hair Salon

by Tosin Akintola, Reason, August 21, 2025.

Excerpt:

When Khalilah Few opened her salon, Creative Crowns Collective, in 2023, she didn’t think her business savvy would put her at odds with the local government. But two years later, she now finds herself in a legal battle with Clayton County, Georgia.

After outgrowing her original studio space, Few signed a two-year lease for a new salon housed in an old barbershop in Jonesboro, a city in Clayton County, in March. She invested over $30,000 into the property and applied for a Conditional Use Permit (CUP) in April to open her salon. Despite meeting the legal requirements for a permit [sic: misplaced modifier in original], the Clayton County Zoning Advisory Board and the Board of Commissioners denied Few’s application in July.

Fixing Higher Ed: The Bailey-Caplan Convo

by Bryan Caplan, betonit, August 22, 2025.

Excerpt:

Last month, Michael Bailey interviewed me on higher education, focusing on my most controversial views. Here’s his list of questions:

1. Although I want to focus attention on what in higher education is worth saving, let’s begin by discussing what is wrong. Just this week you cosigned what I believe is an important statement from the Manhattan Institute, “The Manhattan Statement on Higher Education.” Can you tell us more about that statement? Like how did it happen, and what are its main points?

2. The statement pinpointed two recent crises that revealed big problems: the 2020 Summer of George Floyd and the past two years of pro-Palestinian protests. To what extent do you think that universities have declined, and when did this happen?

DRH Note: Bryan Caplan is on fire. He’s at his scintillating best.

Postscript: This is a longer list of highlights than usual. The reason is that it’s the last “highlight reel” I’m doing. I’ll explain in a blog post tomorrow.