Independent Institute Senior Fellow Robert Higgs is interviewed by Scott Horton of Antiwar Radio on the widening gap between public and private sector pay, the increasing affluence of military towns compared with others, the disappearance of traditional checks on government power, and the predation and incremental “ratchet effect” of expanding governmental powers that increase “temporarily” during wartime but never really recede.

Independent Institute Senior Fellow Robert Higgs is interviewed on “Government’s Intrusions Threaten Economy.” Interviewed by Steve Stanek of the Heartland Institute, Dr. Higgs explains that the government’s growing intrusions into the economy—bank bailouts, economic stimulus, interest rate manipulations and credit expansion by the Federal Reserve, increased business regulations—could eventually lead to soaring price inflation and interest rates and another, far worse economic downturn. The solution is to move deliberately to end such policies and the accumulation of federal bureaucratic programs, controls and taxes on Americans.

Robert Higgs is interviewed here by Scott Horton of Antiwar Radio. They discuss the economic baloney of mainstream economists, the failure of most to understand the potential for mass inflation given the money supply currently sitting around in bank reserves, the reality of the business cycle and the politicians’ and media’s failure to grasp it, and why none of us should make sweeping predictions about how the future will unfold, even if we do understand economics, since human action and the flexibility of markets are impossible to quantify.

Independent Institute Senior Fellow Robert Higgs debates James Galbraith (Professor of Economics, University of Texas; son of infamous, “liberal”, Keynesian economist John Kenneth Galbraith) on Antiwar Radio regarding the folly of government bailouts for insolvent banks, creation of the Glass-Steagall Act as a means to prevent FDIC insured banks from taking excessive risks, benefits and detriments of public and private regulation and oversight, problems of regulatory capture and revolving door politics, divergent opinions on the causes of the Great Depression and efficacy of the New Deal and the arguments for and against government spending on public infrastructure.

Syndicated talk show host Dennis Prager interviews Robert Higgs on Obama’s stimulus plan and dispelling myths surrounding wartime spending. Prager admits to wanting to fly to Louisiana just to hug Bob.

With the hearings on the nomination of Elena Kagan to the U.S. Supreme Court, Research Fellow William J. Watkins, Jr., was interviewed on NPR’s Talk of the Nation to discuss how to revise the nomination and selection process of Supreme Court Justices, based on his recent article in the Washington Examiner, “A role for the people in judicial selection.”

Senior Fellow Robert Higgs is interviewed here by Scott Horton on Antiwar.com Radio, warning those who long for total governmental and economic collapse to be careful what they wish for. Higgs also explains why federal spending cannot continue at the current record levels without a failure of the bond market. He further compares the military and economic over-extension of the Soviet Union prior to its collapse to the United States as a warning against rampant spending by the government.