The amount of improper pandemic payments dwarfs what its new agents stand to recoup for taxpayers. By Phil Gramm and Jodey Arrington Aug. 10, 2023 5:37 pm ET Criminals stole at least $1 trillion from taxpayers during the pandemic. To date the Biden administration has offered only lip service and modest...
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Category Archives: Uncategorized
WSJ-How Congress Can Stop Biden’s Regulatory Onslaught
If they stay united, House Republicans can use the power of the purse to restrain unilateral executive action. By Phil Gramm and Mike Solon July 13, 2023 5:38 pm ET Before the rise of the regulatory state, America’s economic exceptionalism flowed from clear constitutional boundaries between the spheres of individual freedom and government...
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WSJ-The Real Stakes of the Debt-Ceiling Fight
Unrestrained spending would crowd out private economic activity and risk triggering a recession. By Phil Gramm and Mike Solon May 21, 2023 5:04 pm ET House Speaker Kevin McCarthy last month mustered the votes for a bill to raise the debt ceiling, thanks in no part to his Democratic colleagues. His victory shifted the topography...
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WSJ-The ‘Gilded Age’ Myth, Then and Now
‘Robber barons’ of the 19th and 21st centuries enrich, not exploit, the poor and middle class. By Phil Gramm and Amity Shlaes May 7, 2023 4:29 pm ET Everything old is new again, and blaming the rich for America’s woes is no exception. The rise of progressivism before the turn of the 20th...
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WSJ-Biden Is Transformational, and Not in a Good Way
His regulatory barrage and failed Progressive-era policies imperil economic exceptionalism in the U.S. By Phil Gramm and Pat Toomey April 24, 2023 1:14 pm ET From Wall Street to Silicon Valley, from the Permian Basin to the Chicago Loop, an iron net of regulation has descended across the American economy. Churchill’s metaphor conveys...
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WSJ-The Global Minimum Tax Shakedown
Biden is holding Congress hostage: Impose the levy, or see foreign nations seize American profit anyway. By Phil Gramm and Mike Solon April 6, 2023 6:34 pm ET The Biden administration wants to make the world safer for tax increases. That’s the message the White House has sent by enjoining the Organization for...
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WSJ-In Today’s Banking Crisis, Echoes of the ’80s
Losses at SVB, Signature and other banks reflect the risk from borrowing short and lending long. By Charles W. Calomiris and Phil Gramm March 28, 2023 3:30 pm ET It’s natural to look to the 2008 subprime crisis for insights about why our banking system is at risk. But that crisis was a...
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WSJ-The Reagan Revolution Was Built on Compromise
Some GOP lawmakers have forgotten that politics is about what’s possible, not what’s perfect. By Phil Gramm Feb. 22, 2023 4:54 pm ET Nowhere have Republicans done themselves more harm than in debasing the GOP’s brand as the party of fiscal responsibility, less government and more freedom. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s effort...
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WSJ-Yes, Use the Debt Ceiling to Control Government Spending
As Biden and the Democrats know, it’s hardly a new idea. By Phil Gramm and Michael Solon Feb. 1, 2023 2:28 pm ET When President Biden came to the Senate in 1973, the cumulative gross debt of the U.S. was a half-a-trillion dollars, and the debt held by the public was 26.5% of...
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WSJ-The SEC Seeks to Supplant the Market
Its mandate doesn’t include telling CEOs how to run their companies and investors how to invest. By Phil Gramm and Hester Peirce Jan. 19, 2023 3:16 pm ET When the financial crisis ended in the summer of 2009, economic prognosticators were virtually unanimous in predicting a strong, sustained recovery. But Obama-era regulatory policy...
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