Yes, agree that there are some low-hanging fruit for economic reform and progress can be made. I actually cite OPP’s macroeconomic stabilization policy efforts in the post that Alex Berger refers to. But as he says impact is hard to attribute, and given that their funding of this area seems somewhat small, I’d be surprised if you could lower interest rates of central banks significantly with only a few million dollars in advocacy funding.
I agree that there’s some progress on ‘”free-market progressive” policies on zoning reform, occupational licensing, and non-competes’, and that there maybe is room for more progress.
But do you think it has already translated into meaningful consumption increases in the lower income deciles?
There are some interesting numbers e.g. on land use reform in an FP report on zoning reform:
that suggest that the effects might be non-trivial if you can get them through. But I think one would have to do quite a bit of advocacy. For things like occupational licensing and zoning and non-compete, trade, macroeconomic policy you get quite strong push-back from vested interests and rent-seekers.
As I say in the next sentence: “Economic policy is also not very neglected by various stakeholders (e.g. political parties have very strong opinions on trade policy).
This contrasts with other things like preventing misinformation, which it seems to me you can often make more progress on, with less backlash.
Yes, agree that there are some low-hanging fruit for economic reform and progress can be made. I actually cite OPP’s macroeconomic stabilization policy efforts in the post that Alex Berger refers to. But as he says impact is hard to attribute, and given that their funding of this area seems somewhat small, I’d be surprised if you could lower interest rates of central banks significantly with only a few million dollars in advocacy funding.
I agree that there’s some progress on ‘”free-market progressive” policies on zoning reform, occupational licensing, and non-competes’, and that there maybe is room for more progress.
But do you think it has already translated into meaningful consumption increases in the lower income deciles?
There are some interesting numbers e.g. on land use reform in an FP report on zoning reform:
https://founderspledge.com/stories/housing-affordability-in-england-executive-summary
that suggest that the effects might be non-trivial if you can get them through. But I think one would have to do quite a bit of advocacy. For things like occupational licensing and zoning and non-compete, trade, macroeconomic policy you get quite strong push-back from vested interests and rent-seekers.
As I say in the next sentence: “Economic policy is also not very neglected by various stakeholders (e.g. political parties have very strong opinions on trade policy).
This contrasts with other things like preventing misinformation, which it seems to me you can often make more progress on, with less backlash.
Yeah, this makes total sense.