That means employers and potential employees should be free to negotiate, agree, or disagree on compensation, and then employ or refuse employment. Of course, I am also for an economy that offers good jobs at high wages; the best and in fact only path to that is economic growth that increases the demand for labor, coupled with an educational system that teaches and trains people so that they can pursue the career of their choice.

In other words, freedom and good government produce more opportunity for everybody. Who could have known that?

Proposition A, which was passed by the voters in November 2024, increased the minimum wage, but it did more than that. It also instituted a complex sick-leave policy for most businesses in Missouri. Many of those same businesses already had more generous leave policies of various types than the one mandated by the new law, but even those businesses were forced by Proposition A to adjust their policies to the new formula. In some cases, those adjustments were going to be less generous to employees in order to adhere to the new requirements.

This is a perfect example of how a law can appear to do one thing—in this case, help employees—while actually doing the opposite—in this case, heaping transaction costs on business, and especially small business, and thereby discouraging those businesses from hiring employees and growing their companies in Missouri.

It’s not the fault of voters that they did not know what the effect of the law would be. Proposition A contained nine pages of detail that even lawyers have difficulty understanding.

The supporters of Proposition A made it a statutory proposition instead of a constitutional amendment because a statutory proposition is easier to get on the ballot. Because Proposition A was only a statutory change, it was within the authority of the legislature to adjust it, and fortunately the legislature has done so by eliminating the onerous sick leave provisions, moderating the minimum wage provisions, and vastly simplifying the burden on small business.

But this whole episode shows why we need initiative petition reforms in Missouri. It is too easy for interest groups to raise large sums of money so that they can mislead voters about complex initiative propositions that are deliberately written to hide their true purpose and likely effects. Even a good ballot summary can’t accurately convey the meaning of nine pages of inscrutable legal jargon.

We’re all for the people deciding the direction of their own government; in fact, we participate every day in the marketplace of ideas with a view to influencing Missourians on behalf of good policy. The initiative petition process is an important tool, but it should be designed so that voters, with a reasonable effort, can be aware of exactly what they are voting on and the choices they are being asked to make.

The post The Missouri Legislature Was Right To Overturn Proposition A appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Take Missouri’s 2018 decision to remove the 174-day minimum school year requirement. The goal was to give school districts greater flexibility in structuring their academic calendars. It worked. By 2023, nearly one third of Missouri districts had adopted four-day school weeks. The policy also had an unintended consequence—students now spend significantly less time in school.

While schools are still required to meet the minimum 1,044-hour requirement, Institute research shows that the average Missouri student is going to school 17 to 29 fewer hours per year than before. Over the course of an entire K–12 education, this equates to losing nearly a quarter of a school year.

This phenomenon is not unique to education policy. Unintended consequences abound in economic and social policies.

• Raising the Minimum Wage: The intention is to help low-income workers earn a living wage. In practice, however, higher labor costs often lead businesses to cut jobs, reduce hours, or replace workers with automation—hurting the very people the policy was meant to help.
• Housing and Zoning Regulations: Efforts to control urban development often result in reduced housing supply, making homes and apartments more expensive. In places with strict zoning laws, such as California and New York, these regulations have contributed to skyrocketing housing costs and homelessness crises.
• Corporate Tax Increases: Policymakers impose higher taxes on corporations to generate more government revenue, but companies respond by moving operations overseas, reducing investment, or passing costs onto consumers.

Public policies are often crafted with the best intentions, yet they reshape human behavior in unpredictable ways. When policymakers overlook economic incentives and fail to anticipate secondary effects, the result is often worse than the problem they set out to fix.

As Missouri’s school calendar experiment shows, flexibility in education policy may be valuable, but policymakers must exercise caution. Legislators should weigh not just the direct outcomes of a policy but also the unintended consequences that ripple through society.

The post Unintended Consequences: When Well-Meaning Policies Backfire appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Regarding the courts, a coalition of Missouri business groups, including the Missouri Chamber of Commerce, has filed a lawsuit challenging Proposition A.

The plaintiffs argue that combining wage increases with sick leave provisions violates the state constitution’s single-subject rule for ballot initiatives. Proposition A, which passed with 58% of the vote, would incrementally increase the minimum wage from $12.30 to $15 by 2026 and provide workers up to seven paid sick days annually starting in May 2025. Supporters contend that wages and benefits are integral to overall compensation and thus constitute a single subject. The Missouri Supreme Court has yet to schedule hearings for the case.

As for the legislature, because the proposition was a statute, the legislature may act to overturn it. One Missouri legislator introduced the Entrepreneur Rights Act, which would exempt some small and seasonal businesses from minimum wage increases.

Supporters may point to California’s recent mandate elevating the minimum wage for fast-food workers to $20 per hour as a triumph for labor rights. However, a closer examination reveals that the anticipated benefits, particularly in job creation, have not materialized. A study from the University of California, Berkeley, initially suggested that the wage hike did not adversely affect employment levels. Yet, upon scrutinizing the data, it becomes evident that fast-food employment in California has grown at a slower pace compared to the national average. In fact, since the law’s implementation, California’s fast-food employment increased by only 1.85%, while the national rate rose by 3.22%. This discrepancy indicates that the wage increase may have hindered job growth within the state. Such outcomes underscore the complexities of implementing blanket wage policies without fully accounting for market dynamics and the potential unintended consequences on employment opportunities.

Show-Me analysts have consistently been critical of the arguments for, and the claimed benefits of, increases in the minimum wage. Minimum wage hikes just don’t deliver on their promises—even if academic studies twist themselves into knots trying to demonstrate otherwise.

The post No, California’s Minimum Wage Hike Did Not Create Jobs appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Download the full policy brief here.

The post The Minimum Wage in Missouri appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The post Missouri Ballot Issues and the Return of Three Mile Island appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

As free-market economists have long explained, raising the minimum wage prices the most vulnerable workers out of a job. It can lead to reduced hours, less full-time work, layoffs, and increased prices for consumers. There is nothing moral about advocating for policies that produce these results.

A new survey from the Employment Policies Institute (EPI) highlights the negative impacts of California’s recent increase in the minimum wage. California passed a law that raised the minimum wage for most fast food restaurants to $20 an hour beginning April 1, 2024. EPI surveyed 182 restaurant operators to assess the effect of the increase in wages.

Here are some of the key findings of the report:

• A majority of restaurants say they have already raised menu prices (98%), reduced employee hours (89%), have limited employee shift pick-up or overtime opportunities, (73%) and reduced staff or consolidated positions (70%).
• Many (75%) say the number of employees will decrease (somewhat decrease, 50%; significantly decrease, 25%).
• Nearly all (99%) say prices will increase, with 73 percent saying they will “significantly increase.”
• A majority (74%) say there is an increase in the likelihood of shutting their restaurants down (somewhat increase, 38%; significantly increase, 36%).

Fast food jobs are entry-level jobs. They are well suited for individuals entering the job market for the first time or individuals who struggle to gain employment elsewhere. As such, they are a stepping stone to further career advancement. I say this as someone who began his career working minimum wage fast food jobs. Raising the minimum wage may help some workers earn more per hour, but it also leads to fewer job openings, diminished hours, and fewer opportunities for less skilled workers.

The post The Moral High Ground and the Minimum Wage appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

In recent years, several studies have also suggested a positive correlation between an increase in the minimum wage and property crime (such as burglary, larceny, and auto theft) committed by young adults, who are disproportionately impacted by an increase in the minimum wage. But why would a minimum wage increase lead to an increase in property crime?

The hypothesis is that when minimum wages increase, low-income and low-skilled workers experience a reduction in hours worked or increased unemployment, which often means a loss of income. The authors conclude that this decrease in earnings, reduction in hours worked, and increase in unemployment contribute to increases in property crime rates.

The effects of raising the minimum wage are particularly felt by workers who are younger, have a lower income, and are less skilled. The Journal of Economics study finds:

. . . using data from the 1998–2016 Uniform Crime Reports, we find that a 10 percent increase in the minimum wage led to increases in property crime arrests for those between the ages of 16-to-24 of approximately 2 to 3 percent.

Intuitively, this makes sense—losing your job or losing hours at your job could increase economic desperation, leading people to commit property crimes such as theft. In addition, jobs help give people structure and keep them on the right track. The Journal of Public Economics study mentions that more labor market opportunities for younger workers reduce criminal behavior because it increases the opportunity cost of crime. If you have a job, you have more to lose if you get caught committing a crime.

What does this all mean for Missourians? Raising the minimum wage can not only lead to fewer hours and jobs, but also more crime. To actually benefit low-income and low-skilled workers, shouldn’t we instead pursue policies that foster an environment enabling businesses to create more jobs, such as tax cuts or eliminating unnecessary occupational licensing?

The post Does the Minimum Wage Impact Crime Rates? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Similar to Missouri’s potential $15.00 minimum wage, Seattle’s minimum wage ordinance passed in 2014 phased in an increasing minimum wage in the City of Seattle from the state’s $9.47 minimum to $11 in 2014, $13 in 2016, and $15 in 2017. A 2017 study at the University of Washington found that the increase to $15 an hour resulted in low-skilled workers experiencing a reduction in hours worked or even job loss. This decrease in hours worked for low-skilled workers resulted in “a net loss of $74 per month.” A pay cut of $74 per month can have a significant impact on low-income workers. The study found that employers opted to replace low-skilled workers with higher-skilled workers who could perform the job more effectively and therefore warrant a wage equivalent to the new minimum wage.

Seattle’s experiences are just one example of how a minimum wage increase negatively affects low-income workers. California recently increased its minimum wage to $20 for fast-food workers, resulting in many workers suffering from a loss of income. Mark Harmsworth, director of the Small Business Center at the Washington Policy Center, said:

Sometimes, instead of a salary bump, many workers instead find their work hours cut or their jobs eliminated completely. For some employees, if they fall below a minimum hour threshold required for benefits, they lose benefits too.

Increasing the minimum wage is a misguided way to try and help workers. If policymakers and voters want to assist low-income workers, then increasing the Earned Income Tax Credit would be a better approach.

The post A Closer Look at the Effects of a $15 Minimum Wage for Missouri appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

In this episode, Susan Pendergrass speaks with Ryan Bourne, the R. Evan Scharf Chair for the Public Understanding of Economics at the Cato Institute and editor of the book The War on Prices: How Popular Misconceptions about Inflation, Prices, and Value Create Bad Policy. They discuss the effects of price controls, recent interventions in the economy, how to remind people about free market principals, and more.

Ryan Bourne occupies the R. Evan Scharf Chair for the Public Understanding of Economics at Cato and is the author of the recent books Economics In One Virus, and The War on Prices. He has written on numerous economic issues, including fiscal policy, inequality, minimum wages, infrastructure spending, the cost of living and rent control.

Listen on Apple Podcasts 

Listen on SoundCloud

Produced by Show-Me Opportunity

The post The War on Prices with Ryan Bourne appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

I think of that again because a new report by the American Enterprise Institute’s Scott Winship, “Understanding Trends in Worker Pay over the Past 50 Years,” addresses the fallacy of that chart and the broader claim that productivity and wages have not grown apace. Contrary to claims from some on both the political left and right, who argue that pay has stagnated despite economic growth, Winship presents evidence that overall compensation has grown in line with productivity when correctly measured.

The analysis begins by correcting misconceptions about wage stagnation. Winship shows that median worker pay, though not rising as dramatically as some top earners, has increased significantly when considering total compensation rather than just hourly wages.

Winship also addresses the discrepancy in pay growth between different groups. He notes that women’s pay has increased more rapidly than men’s over the past several decades.

Winship suggests that instead of accepting a gloomy narrative of failing capitalism or deteriorating worker conditions, policymakers should focus on boosting productivity and enhancing skills among middle- and working-class Americans.

The report paints a more optimistic picture of American workers’ pay trends relative to productivity over the past fifty years. While there are opportunities to enact policies that could improve workers’ economic mobility, they must be built on the solid understanding of wages that Winship advances.

The post New AEI Report Challenges Gloomy Views of Worker Pay appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The post Comments on Increasing the Minimum Wage in Missouri appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Next month during his State of the State address, Governor Parson will lay out his budget recommendations for the 2023 fiscal year. In addition, there are supplemental funding requests for our current fiscal year that require immediate legislative attention. The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has requested approximately $2 billion be appropriated from federal relief funds by April, Missouri’s Medicaid expansion population will run out of funding soon, and the governor has recommended a $15 minimum wage along with a 5.5% pay raise for state employees starting February 1st.

My updated report provides the context necessary to fully understand the tough task ahead for Missouri’s legislature. It also provides a step-by-step explanation of the state’ budgeting process, a graphic explaining the expected timeline for the budget, and a detailed description of many of the difficult decisions required to craft and maintain a constitutionally-required balanced budget. As lawmakers discuss the economic forecasts for the coming year and decide how much to raise future state spending obligations, this report should help provide some valuable insight.

Click here to read the full report.

The post Missouri’s Budget: A Primer (Update) appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Next month during his State of the State address, Governor Parson will lay out his budget recommendations for the 2023 fiscal year. In addition, there are supplemental funding requests for our current fiscal year that require immediate legislative attention. The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has requested approximately $2 billion be appropriated from federal relief funds by April, Missouri’s Medicaid expansion population will run out of funding soon, and the governor has recommended a $15 minimum wage along with a 5.5% pay raise for state employees starting February 1st.

My updated report provides the context necessary to fully understand the tough task ahead for Missouri’s legislature. It also provides a step-by-step explanation of the state’ budgeting process, a graphic explaining the expected timeline for the budget, and a detailed description of many of the difficult decisions required to craft and maintain a constitutionally-required balanced budget. As lawmakers discuss the economic forecasts for the coming year and decide how much to raise future state spending obligations, this report should help provide some valuable insight.

Click here to read the full report.

The post Missouri Budget: A Primer (Update) appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Listen on Apple Podcasts 

Listen on Sticher 

Listen on SoundCloud

The post Podcast: 2022 Priorities, a Win in Webster, and Fight for $15 in Jeff. City appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The Institute for Justice’s report examines the debt and dropout rate of cosmetology students across the country, and the numbers are pretty shocking. To receive a cosmetology license in Missouri, one must complete 1,500 educational hours from an accredited cosmetology program. From the 2011–12 school year to the 2016–17 school year, the average cosmetology program cost $14,629 and students took on an average of more than $7,700 in federal student loans.

That’s not pocket change, but it’s even worse when earnings are considered. In Missouri, the median annual wage of a licensed cosmetologist in 2019 was $23,760. That’s slightly lower than the national average of around $26,000 for licensed cosmetologists and slightly higher than yearly earnings from a full-time minimum wage job. (For reference, earning Missouri’s minimum wage of $10.30 for 40 hours per week and 52 weeks per year equates to yearly earnings of $21,424.) And more than two thirds of students do not graduate on time, increasing their debt burden even more.

So much money is spent to fulfill a state educational requirement, but is that requirement even necessary? Occupational licensing is intended to protect the health and safety of consumers, but recent research indicates that only 25 percent of cosmetology training is health and safety training.

Occupational licensing increases costs to consumers, but the other side of that coin is often overlooked. Licensing requirements dramatically increase costs for the workers who must obtain that license to earn a living. This is especially true in cosmetology, where the costs are directly tied to licensing requirements, but this is also true no matter the cost or resulting wages. It’s time for legislators to reconsider these requirements, regulations, and boards that have burdened workers and consumers for too long. A sunset provision for occupational licenses would be a great step toward reducing burdens and costs for consumers and workers.

The post Costs of a Cosmetology License appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

I have to say I am disturbed. During last night’s debate, the conversation seemed to make it clear that some senators have more common cause with local political officials than they do with the people who elected them. The role of the legislature isn’t to simply defend bad local decisions. The role of the legislature is to defend constituents—the people who elected them in the first place—against bad local decisions.

Keep in mind it wasn’t long ago that the state stopped local officials from banning plastic bags. The state was also okay with stopping local officials from hiking their minimum wages locally, for fear of the business-destroying effects the higher wage requirement might have.

But straight up banning entire categories of legal businesses from operating for indeterminate periods of time?

The state senate is A-OK with that.

How excruciatingly unserious.

State elected officials are elected by the public, not by local bureaucrats, and it’s the interests of those regular Missourians that the legislature is duty-bound to prioritize. State officials need to realize now, not later, that they are elected to be a check on local officials. Their job is not to rubber stamp business-destroying decisions simply because a local official did it. Their job is to fight those decisions and protect their constituents from them.

The post Who Will Speak For the Family Businesses They Shut Down? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Titled “Myth or Measurement: What Does the New Minimum Wage Research Say about Minimum Wages and Job Loss in the United States?” it surveys the existing research on the effects of the minimum wage.

What does it find? According to the authors:

Our key conclusions are: (i) there is a clear preponderance of negative estimates in the literature; (ii) this evidence is stronger for teens and young adults as well as the less-educated; (iii) the evidence from studies of directly-affected workers points even more strongly to negative employment effects; and (iv) the evidence from studies of low-wage industries is less one-sided.

Labor economics isn’t my field of expertise, but from an outsider’s perspective, raising the minimum wage doesn’t look good!

The post New Summary of Minimum Wage Research Shows Negative Effects appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

This post is intended to address a concern that my critics may raise. I can already hear the question: Don’t you think students should have a voice in important issues that affect them and society?

The answer is a resounding yes!

But we can achieve that without pushing a political ideology on students and without the explicit aim of turning students into activists. And, importantly, giving students a voice should not be the only goal of civics education. Indeed, voice by itself is neither a good or bad thing. An uninformed voice can do harm to the individual and society.

The primary goal of civics education, apart from helping students understand how government works, should be to help students be reflective and compassionate individuals. It should be to equip them with the tools to weigh arguments and to decide on a course of action, not to leap to a course of action, consequences be damned.

In their report on action civics, Thomas Lindsay and Lucy Meckler examined 27 political projects listed on the website of Generation Citizen, an action civics organization. Let’s consider just two of the issues noted by Lindsay and Meckler—raising the minimum wage and funding a year-round homeless shelter for LGBTQ+ youth.

Action civics would have the students identify an issue (in this case, poverty), identify a cause (low wages), and advocate for a solution (increase the minimum wage). But of course, there are many other issues at play here. The goal of action civics is to have students do something about the problem. A better goal is to help students understand the issues surrounding a problem. In a discussion about the minimum wage, or any other contentious issue, a good teacher should ask students to consider various viewpoints. If those views do not come up naturally from other students, the teacher should even play devil’s advocate. They should ask: What will happen if businesses are required to raise the wages they pay? Where will the money come from? Do you think this will lead businesses to hire more or fewer workers? Who will be hurt or helped by increasing the minimum wage?

These are discussions students and teachers should have. It is okay at the end of the day for the students to still support raising the minimum wage. It is not okay for them to never hear the other arguments or question their assumptions.

Similarly, consider the project where students advocated for funding a homeless shelter for LGBTQ+ youth. Here is how the discussion between a teacher and students should go: “That’s an interesting idea. How much do you think something like that would cost? And how do you suppose the city should pay for it? Of course, city officials must balance the budget, so the money must come from somewhere. Either they will have to reduce costs somewhere else or they will have to increase revenue. Why does the government have to open the shelter? Is it possible this could be done through private philanthropy?” These are the issues students should be wrestling with.

There is a fundamental difference between the goals of action civics and what I consider to be the primary goals of civics education. Action civics proponents want students to do civics. The goal is to launch students to action, to become activists. But activism is not the goal of education; at least, not in my view.

I believe civics education should help students understand civics and civil dialogue. Not all problems require a government solution and even when they do, not all government solutions work the way we intend them. A good citizen is not one who leaps to action to impose their will on others, but one who reflectively contemplates issues from other points of view. Moreover, as the research of those supporting action civics suggests, most citizens believe being a personally responsible individual who exercises their rights as citizens is exactly what we want to see in our fellow citizens. Action civics downplays this notion of the “personally responsible citizen.” That is simply wrongheaded.

The post Action Civics: Teaching Students to Become Activists (Part 3 of 3) appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

It turns out, Target workers themselves.

After Target raised its employees’ wages, Target then proceeded to cut their hours. A CNN story highlighted the workers’ frustration.

“I got that dollar raise but I’m getting $200 less in my paycheck. I have no idea how I’m going to pay for rent or buy food,” one worker commented.

Workers didn’t just lose hours—some lost benefits. Target employees must average 30 hours per week to qualify for health insurance benefits. But the reduction in hours worked pushed some employees below 30 hours, costing them health care benefits. The negative impact of such a policy was predictable.

The vast majority of people earning the minimum wage are not trying to live solely on that wage. The typical minimum wage worker is someone who is under 25, still in college, working part time, and living in a family well above poverty. According to a 2017 Government Accountability Office report, only 13 percent of households with someone earning between $7.25 and $12 per hour were in poverty.

Raising the minimum wage benefits some lucky teenagers at the expense of the working poor. Show-Me Institute analysts have discussed this problem many times before, most recently regarding Missouri’s decision to raise the state’s minimum wage to $12 per hour by 2023.

Perhaps Target’s situation will help people see that the negative consequences of minimum wage increases are more than theoretical. Policies targeted specifically at the desired recipients, like the earned-income tax credit, are more effective at incentivizing hard work than a one-size-fits-all policy.

If we want to help the working poor, raising the minimum wage is simply not the way to do it.

The post Fight for 15 . . . Hours Per Week? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Well, my friend, if you are, I have to admit: You had a couple of modest “wins” in 2018. Here in Missouri, free-market thinking took it on the chin in two ballot initiatives. On Aug. 7, by an overwhelming majority, Missourians voted to kill a right-to-work law passed by the Missouri Legislature in 2017. Then on Nov. 6, Missouri voters passed another ballot initiative boosting the state’s minimum wage from today’s $7.85 to $12 by 2023.

Compared with other news, however, those victories by deep-pocketed trade union groups and their co-dependent, big-government allies were small beer. The year’s big story was the striking success at the national level of free-market policies in driving faster growth and widely shared prosperity for all groups of people. For two years, the federal government has been lifting the burden of regulations and taxes on businesses and consumers alike. The dynamism of American capitalism has done the rest.

Recent GDP growth has been close to 4 percent – or about double the rate sustained over the eight years of the prior administration. Suddenly, there are more job openings than people seeking work. That, in turn, has led to higher pay for people at all income levels.

On Oct 2, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced that he was raising his company’s internal minimum wage for warehouse and other unskilled workers to $15 an hour. This led to mutual back-slapping between Bernie Sanders and Bezos. The self-declared socialist complimented the world’s richest man on “doing the right thing,” and Bezos responded with self-congratulations, saying he hoped that other companies would follow his lead.

But guess what? He wasn’t leading. The U.S. Labor Department recently reported that wages for nonsupervisory warehouse employees had risen 4.6 percent from a year earlier, to $17.87 an hour. That’s almost $3 an hour more than the wage set by Amazon’s act of supposed enlightenment. Faced with the demands of an expanding economy and a tight labor market, companies did what they had to do – they raised wages to poach workers or keep the ones they have. So it wasn’t Mr. Bezos who deserved the compliment, but the unimpeded operation of the free market.

If you look around the country and the world, you see people everywhere who are fed up with the cluelessness of wealthy and long-established political elites who continue to pursue highly questionable policy objectives regardless of the cost in higher taxes, reduced paychecks, and lost economic growth. We are witnessing what the Wall Street Journal calls a “Global Carbon Tax Revolt,” with ordinary people rising up in protest against fuel-tax hikes and costly climate-change initiatives aimed at boosting unreliable renewable power. That has happened with the violent “Yellow Vest” protests in Paris and many rural areas that have rocked the presidency of France’s Emmanuel Macron. Other hot spots in the same revolt by taxpayers opposed to sacrificing growth on the altar of environmental piety include Germany and Canada, along with the states of Arizona, California, and Washington.

In sum, 2018 was a bad year for government-failure deniers. It was a much better year for those who believe in the unrivaled power of free markets to create and spread wealth and to promote greater individual freedom, responsibility, and creativity. But 2018 wasn’t all roses either, with rising fears of a global trade war sparked by retaliatory tariffs.

Tariffs are another tax – a tax on commerce. Of course, the more you tax something, the less you get of it. Missouri is a soybean basket to the world. Our state can ill afford a major disruption in world commerce. Neither can the nation. Looking ahead to 2019, let us hope that the substantial economic gains made in 2018 are not jeopardized or lost through the folly of managed (or mismanaged) trade policy.

The post 2018: A Bad Year for Government-failure Deniers appeared first on Show-Me Institute.