Somebody named Joe left a comment explaining that he didn't like my post about New York rent control. I was going to reply in the comments, but my response got long enough that I decided to make it a post. Normally, I do that when a commenter brings up interesting points, but in this case I wanted to point out some particularly annoying argument tactics. It's sad that, as soon … [Read more...] about It Helps To Have an Argument
Clap If You Believe In Rent Control
While idling my brain on Twitter, I stumbled across Jordan Fraade promoting his Baffler article about how New York needs rent control. It's a little like discovering a grown-up who believes in fairies. For something that so deeply affects the workings of the city’s housing market, rent regulation in New York is widely misunderstood. At a recent event put on by the Pratt … [Read more...] about Clap If You Believe In Rent Control
A Few Words About the Memories Pizza Story
A few days ago, when I first decided to try to write something about the Religious Freedom Restoration Act in Indiana, I looked for a quote I could start with, and I found one about a small family-owned pizza joint called Memories Pizza in Walkerton, Indiana, where the owners were saying they won't cater any gay weddings: “If a gay couple came in and wanted us to provide … [Read more...] about A Few Words About the Memories Pizza Story
Windypundit Technical Review
In an earlier post, I wrote, The whole point of a blog like this is to share everything on the site with literally anyone who wants to see it. In fact, I’ve gone through rather a lot of trouble to make sure that happens. That got me thinking about all the bits of technology that it takes to put a blog like this on the web. I decided to make a list, and it turns out there are … [Read more...] about Windypundit Technical Review
Denying Scarcity Is Not an Option
This post turns out to be one of my longer ones. The tl;dr is that (1) a good policy is one that makes lives better, (2) the best policy is the one that makes lives better the most, (3) even the best policy can't give people everything they want, and (4) it's unrealistic to deny point 3.Greg Laden has a post criticizing Bjorn Lomborg's position on the effects of sea level … [Read more...] about Denying Scarcity Is Not an Option