RealClearMarkets Articles

The Iran Discussion Would Be Lots Improved By a Little Tolstoy

John Tamny - June 21, 2025

Central planning fails, always and everywhere. Leo Tolstoy wasn’t the first to see this, but he provided readers with one of the best articulations of the previous truth in War and Peace. In it, Tolstoy rejected all the “great man” theories of war. He’d seen war up close, and knew that the natural human instinct to survive rendered the best-laid war plans mostly ridiculous, and much worse, tragic. Human action can’t be centrally planned, and the truth of the latter is multiplied when lives are at stake. Which is why it’s both comical and sad to read so much...

In Colorado, Jared Polis Is Defying the Wishes of Unions

Charles Sauer - June 20, 2025

Colorado Governor Jared Polis did something almost unheard of for a Democratic elected official: defied union bosses by vetoing legislation that would have expanded their power to force workers to join a union or pay union dues. After all, unions are one of the major sources of financial and “volunteer” support for Democrats. The union bosses' political machine is funded by dues collected from workers—many of whom are forced to pay union dues or lose their jobs.  Of course, the workers have no say in which politicians receive support from the unions....

High Pay at Buc-ee's Rejects the Left and Right's Economics

John Tamny - June 20, 2025

Buc-ee’s, the creator of the world’s greatest gas/charging stations and accompanying convenience stores that are beyond football field length, doesn’t need a law to compensate its employees well. Just the same, Buc-ee’s doesn’t consult “supply and demand” charts to happen on the “right” employee wages. Which means Buc-ee’s is a wonderful rejection of left AND right and their increasingly bogus economics. To see why the above is true, consider the new Buc-ee’s location in Pass Christian, MS. Mississippi is a poor state by U.S....

There Should Be a "No Crying" Rule In All Areas Of Leadership

Rob Smith - June 20, 2025

I’m not a big fan of the 19th Amendment. Don’t get me wrong—I value women as much as men—I just think when it comes to rational decision-maki… oops, phone’s ringing. I’ll be back. Where was I? Have any of y’all ever been squirrel hunting? Women are like squirrels. The last time I went was with my buddy Jeff Brooks. We were in college and floated down the Pamunkey River. Because we were on the river and not walking through the woods making noise, we got to witness squirrels in their natural habitat. One: they are constantly...


The Commodification of AI For a Leaner, Better Future

Steve Brotman - June 20, 2025

Artificial intelligence is undergoing a fundamental shift toward cost efficiency, accessibility, and real-world applications over sheer scale. This was highlighted during the DeepSeek craze that rattled markets amid (debated) rumors the company only spent $6 million to develop its model, but aside from that episode, the broader narrative of AI commodification and declining costs has only just begun. In tech, it’s key to remember the early stages of innovation often see infrastructure layer companies attracting massive capital inflows to build out foundational systems – typically...

The IRS Badly Needs Reform, But Billy Long Isn't the One to Reform It

Bruce Willey - June 20, 2025

The U.S. Senate last week confirmed the Trump Administration’s new IRS Commissioner, for U.S. Rep. Billy Long. Unfortunately nothing in Long’s record suggests he’s up to the task of rebuilding the IRS’s credibility with the American public. The IRS has lost its way and needs a major rebuild. I’ve been a tax professional for more than 35 years and the performance of the IRS has fallen through the floor. And Commissioner Long, a 69 year-old, six term ex-Congressman from Missouri, is a former auctioneer with no accounting or tax training and no...

The Myths About "Trump Voters" and Their Preferences

John Tamny - June 19, 2025

Donald Trump’s policies aren’t what won him a majority of voters in the most recent election, or a majority of electoral votes in 2016. More realistically, it was Donald Trump who won the presidency both times. Opinion pieces continue to gloss over this. Take a recent piece by the great Kathleen Parker at the Washington Post. Writing about Hannah Arendt and her discovery of the “lonely” and “needy” Germans who fell for Hitler, Parker saw the past in the present. In her words, “There’s no denying similarities between this description...

Texas Is Becoming the Center of Gravity for American Capitalism

James Lee - June 19, 2025

For the past 25 years, America has been plagued by a troubling trend. The number of publicly traded companies in the U.S. has fallen by 43 percent, while the number of sponsor-backed private firms has surged fourfold. There are now 2.5x as many private equity-owned companies as public ones. Meanwhile, public markets in countries around the world—including key economic competitors—are booming. The number of publicly traded companies globally has grown by nearly 35 percent. These are symptoms of deeper problems facing American businesses: rising costs, regulatory overreach, and a...


The Heavy Weight of Taxes On Small Business

Peter Hansen - June 19, 2025

Imagine you’re climbing a mountain with a backpack full of heavy stones. You’re strong and have the will to manage, but the weight is significant. It is always a pain, and it always slows you down. This is, more or less, what taxes are for small business owners.  For more than 50 years, the National Federation of Independent Business has tracked the top issues facing small business owners (alongside other metrics like revenue and employment growth). This extensive research history shows that taxes have been the most consistent issue faced by Main Street.  To stretch...

Europe's Contempt for Big U.S. Business Is Rooted In Envy

Paul Steidler - June 19, 2025

In the classic movie The Godfather, Michael Corleone advises a young man to get a business degree to supplement his fine arts education to better provide for his future children. “This contempt for money is just another trick of the rich to keep the poor without it,” says Corleone. European regulators’ contempt towards large U.S. businesses shows a similar manipulative cynicism towards its people. While the European Union (EU), through its Parliament and governing European Commission, has adopted onerous laws and imposed draconian fines for years, mostly against the...

$100 Million for Your Data? Trump Missteps on Privacy and Palantir

Jason Pye - June 18, 2025

Since its release this month in 1949, far before the advent of the internet—let alone artificial intelligence—George Orwell’s timeless novel 1984 has left generations with one primary warning: “Big Brother is always watching.” Now more than ever, it feels in America that Big Brother truly is here. While many opine about the dangers of private companies holding information and data about civilians, the real warning that 1984 gives us—which may be in our near future—is a consolidation of governmental entities that hold our information and data. In...

Bitcoin Will Never Circulate As Money, But Amazon and Walmart Will

John Tamny - June 18, 2025

Do you take Amazon or Walmart dollars? In the question it’s easy to see the problem with bitcoin, and other well-known speculations. People aren’t prone to storing their wealth meant for essentials in speculative instruments. Which is why bitcoin will never be broadly circulated as money. See its well-documented turbulence. Really, who would speculate on bitcoin while also using it as money? The question vivifies the problem. Money is a medium of exchange that makes it possible for products to be exchanged for products. But since Bitcoin’s biggest proponents make the rather...


Traditional Media Parrot the Democrats' Attacks On GOP Tax Cuts

Bruce Thompson - June 18, 2025

As the tax debate  heats up in the Senate, Congressional Democrats are stepping up their misleading and inaccurate attacks on Republican tax cuts. Democrats in the House and Senate are all calling the tax bill a “billionaires tax cut,” a totally inaccurate description. Senate Minority Leader Schumer calls it a “billionaire giveaway.”  House Democrats falsely describe the bill as a $4.5 trillion tax cut for “billionaires and big corporations.”Unfortunately, the mainstream media, which should know better, is parroting the Democratic charges line for...

It's Time to Excise the 'Double Drawback' Loophole

Justin Leventhal - June 18, 2025

More than 230 years ago, one of the first acts of the First Congress in 1789 included a relatively mundane, but important, tax policy allowing a refund on excise taxes. Unfortunately, this has become a corporate subsidy for the tobacco and alcohol industries. This, seemingly trivial, provision refunded excise taxes on imports that are later exported. This makes the U.S. a desirable intermediary port for international supply chains, as there is no penalty for shipping through American ports. It is common practice in many countries and is usually entirely uncontroversial, unless...

With Temu Attacks, We See Politicians Were Sadly Never Stopping at TikTok

John Tamny - June 18, 2025

Temu is a low-cost online marketplace that has had the temerity to achieve popularity with American buyers while also being Chinese. In response to Temu’s achievements in the world’s most competitive consumer market, Nebraska attorney general Mike Hilgers has filed a complaint that Temu installs “malware” of some kind that gives the company access to “sensitive information.”  That’s too bad, and it signals that American politicians are more in the business of protecting U.S. businesses from competition than they care about national security....

Apple Pushes Back As the EU Attacks Its Precious Property

Kyle Moran - June 17, 2025

Make no mistake: The European Union has handed Mark Zuckerberg unprecedented access to European citizens’ digital privacy. Last week, Apple formally appealed the EU’s interoperability mandate, stating that it was doing so on behalf of European users whose privacy would be harmed by the ruling. In its appeal, Apple claims that companies have already requested access to users’ “most sensitive data — from the content of their notifications to a full history of every stored WiFi network on their device—giving them the ability to access personal information...


Spending Cuts Won't Shrink Government, and May Well Expand It

John Tamny - June 17, 2025

It’s easy to forget that individual saving in no way shrinks consumption. Short of placing money saved into a coffee can, to save is to shift consumptive ability to someone else. What’s true about individual saving is true about government savings. No act of parsimony shrinks the size of government either. That’s why Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) wouldn’t have worked even if it had worked.   Short of the savings being placed in a much bigger coffee can, government spending cuts born of efficiency, headcount reduction, mandate...

The Tax Code Is Punishing Savers, But Congress Has a Fix

Pinar Cebi Wilber - June 17, 2025

As the politics of the reconciliation bill get messier by the day, new data is shining light on the financial standing of Americans and how the economy is impacting them. According to a recent survey by Vanguard, more Americans are tapping into their retirement accounts for emergency expenses, such as covering medical bills and preventing foreclosure or eviction. In one sense, it is great to see that Americans have access to retirement accounts for emergencies and that they are accumulating wealth in these accounts, but it is also important to remember to keep these accounts intact for a...

Contra Klaus Schwab, Government Cannot Create Prosperity

Donald Wilkie - June 17, 2025

There is no sense living in a free country without prosperity. Think Klaus Schwab of the global elites, “You will own nothing but be happy.” How charming. If we want to own something, we should understand the system that creates prosperity and then protect it. Are you aware that many economists have no idea how prosperity is created? Their fallback position is “it’s complicated.”  No, it is not. We come from nature, from planet Earth. Understanding nature gives us a starting point for the mechanics of prosperity. Students of nature have described...

Are CVS, Mondelez and McDonald's Silencing Shareholders?

Stefan Padfield - June 16, 2025

The ability of shareholders to attend corporate annual meetings, ask questions, and express their views is considered by many to be critical to effective corporate governance. For example, a post in the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance noted that: “While it is not explicitly a legal right, shareholders expect to be able to ask questions at shareholder meetings, and companies have long included time for questions from shareholders at their annual meetings.” However, the rise of virtual meetings may have made it too easy for corporations to ignore...

Market Overview
Search Stock Quotes