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Property Rights and Poverty
Last week, I wrote about the relationship between property rights and human flourishing. Writing on Forbes.com, Chuck DeVore provides further evidence of the value of property rights in lifting individuals out of poverty. Citing a report from the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University, DeVore concludes, “There is a close connection between the…
A Room with a View
The owner of a Miami Beach hotel—Setai Hotel Acquisition LLC–is suing the city over a zoning change. Zoning officials approved a change that would allow BHI Miami Limited to make additions to a building it recently purchased. Setai claims that the additions will block ocean views in many of its rooms, those views are a…
Property Rights and Pollution, Part 3
In Part 1, we examined the “tragedy of the commons.” In Part 2, we examined how property rights can be applied to water. In Part 3, we will examine how property rights can be applied to air. The following is an excerpt from The Innovator Versus the Collective. In the case of air, nuisance laws provide…
The State has a Hammer and You are a Nail
ByjbpThis was originally posted on Live Oaks on September 15, 2009. Comments have not been migrated. On Saturday, the Chronicle reported that Spec’s Liquor gave up its fight over its Washington Avenue store. A city ordinance prohibits liquor stores from being within 1,000 feet of a school. The store in question is about 665 feet…
Property Rights and Natural Monopolies, Part 1
The following is an excerpt from The Innovator Versus the Collective. For seventy years, Americans were told that the AT&T monopoly was good for consumers, and as a result, competition in the telephone industry was prohibited. Yet, within a few years of legalized competition, consumers had far more choices and lower priced telephone service and…
Progress and Poverty
Henry George was an American journalist and political economist. His book Progress and Poverty (1879) was one of the best selling books of its time. While he was considered an advocate of free trade (he opposed tariffs), George was a staunch opponent of property rights. In Progress and Poverty, George argued that labor is the…