Last week, a Texas appellate court ruled that certain provisions of Austin’s short-term rental (STR) regulations were unconstitutional. Those regulations, which were passed in 2015, intended to outlaw full-time STRs by 2022. In its ruling, the court correctly noted that existing nuisance laws are sufficient to deal with the few problems caused by STRs. The…
Across the nation, more than 30 percent of the workforce requires the government’s permission to work in certain professions. From law to hair braiding, from medicine to plumbing, individuals aren’t free to create values and trade them with willing consumers. Instead, they must undergo useless and expensive training in order to get the state’s permission…
Productiveness is the virtue of creating the material values that life requires. The first Thanksgiving was an implicit celebration of this virtue. It was a celebration that almost didn’t occur. The Pilgrims’ first years in America were filled with suffering. And this isn’t surprising, for land was owned and farmed in common–there was no private…
The Austin Statesman recently published an opinion piece about President Trump’s border wall that states, Trump has said he is ready to take land from uncooperative property owners through eminent domain [to build the wall]. That creates a dilemma for Trump’s conservative supporters. Which do they want more: A border wall? Or private property rights?…
The Trump Administration is reportedly preparing “Declaration of Taking” papers that would allow the federal government to seize private property in Texas for the border wall. While the government’s threat to seize land for the wall is nothing new, the “Declaration of Taking” is new. The government has long threatened to use eminent domain to…
Individuals across the political spectrum decry the influence of money on political elections. Many want to severely limit campaign contributions, and others would like political campaigns to be financed by tax dollars. But neither of these address the fundamental issue, and indeed, they illustrate the fundamental problem. The reason that so much money is donated…
We are constantly presented with some “crisis,” some issue that the media, activists, and politicians claim requires immediate attention and action. They focus on some problem, whether real or imagined, and argue that we must do something. Today. But after today comes tomorrow. Certainly, there are times in life when immediate action is necessary to…
In America today, humility is widely regarded as a virtue. In connotation and denotation, humility is viewed as having a low view of one’s importance. In contrast, pride is widely regard as a vice. Indeed, in Christian morality, pride is the worst of sins. But pride means “a becoming or dignified sense of what is…
Every violation of property rights, from zoning to eminent domain, from minimum wage to occupational licensing, ultimately stems from a disagreement regarding the creation, use, or trade of material values. And the solution proposed by the advocates of every violation of property rights is essentially the same: Use government to force those with whom they…
The political policies that we embrace and advocate today do more than impact our lives in the short-term. They impact and shape the lives of our children, grandchildren, and countless generations to come. If we make the right decisions, we can provide our children and grandchildren with freedom and opportunity. We can enable them to…
In his 1840 book What is Property? French anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon wrote, “Property is theft!” Proudhon’s statement has been embraced by many on the political Left, even if they have never heard of him. And they are guilty of the same evasions as Proudhon. In Proudhon’s time, land was the primary form of property, and…
We are frequently confronted with claims that LGBT rights are under attack by conservatives. There is a problem with this claim, and the problem is: There is no such thing as LGBT rights. There are only individual rights, and they apply to all individuals, including lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transgenders, and heterosexuals. The problem with any…