Economics


The Calling: The Importance of Assuming Self-Interested Politicians

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With the death last week of Nobel laureate economist James Buchanan, the freedom movement has lost one of its most important thinkers. Unfortunately, Buchanan’s work often gets boiled down to the seemingly trivial observation that politicians are self-interested. Put that way, it’s too easy for people to respond, “Everyone knows that!” Although it’s true that the assumption of self-interested politicians ...