Pitch Engine
The Property Pack

.

Vital Signs: why 'the marketplace for ideas' can fail – from an economist's perspective

  • Written by Richard Holden, Professor of Economics, UNSW
Vital Signs: why 'the marketplace for ideas' can fail – from an economist's perspectiveShutterstock

There is no shortage of repugnant and dangerous ideas in the world. An age old question is whether free speech will see good ideas win out over bad.

The proposition that good ideas eventually triumph in “the marketplace for ideas” dates at least to 1644, when John Milton wrote in his anti-censorship tract Areopagitica:

Let...

Read more: Vital Signs: why 'the marketplace for ideas' can fail – from an economist's perspective

More Articles ...

  1. About that spare room: employers requisitioned our homes and our time
  2. Footy crowds: what the AFL and NRL need to turn sport into show business
  3. How to improve JobKeeper (hint: it would help not to pay businesses late)
  4. By sacking staff and closing stores, big businesses like The Warehouse could hurt their own long-term interests
  5. You better hope your work cleaner is one of the few who has time to do a thorough job
  6. Businesses get extension for instant asset write-off
  7. Economists back wage freeze 21-19 in new Economic Society-Conversation survey
  8. Sun, sand and uncertainty: the promise and peril of a Pacific tourism bubble
  9. Fast moves in India-Australia relations risk pushing millions more into modern slavery
  10. HomeBuilder might be the most-complex least-equitable construction jobs program ever devised
  11. After Robodebt, it's time to address ParentsNext
  12. Vital signs. Remembering Alberto Alesina, the father of political economy
  13. Scott Morrison’s HomeBuilder scheme is classic retail politics but lousy economics
  14. Brands backing Black Lives Matter: it might be a marketing ploy, but it also shows leadership
  15. Why even the best case for jobs isn't good. We'll need more JobKeeper
  16. How a tightening of wallets pushed Australia into recession
  17. Working from home remains a select privilege: it's time to fix our national employment standards
  18. Our needlessly-precise definition of a recession is causing us needless trouble
  19. Money for social housing, not home buyers grants, is the key to construction stimulus
  20. Australia's first service sector recession will be unlike those that have gone before it
  21. Digital-only local newspapers will struggle to serve the communities that need them most
  22. A four-day working week could be the shot in the arm post-coronavirus tourism needs
  23. Morrison government invites unions to dance, but employer groups call the tune
  24. What COVID-19 means for the people making your clothes
  25. Morrison wants unions and business to 'put down the weapons' on IR. But real reform will not be easy.
  26. Why flour is still missing from supermarket shelves
  27. Open, honest and effective: what makes Jacinda Ardern an authentic leader
  28. Why the coronavirus shouldn't stand in the way of the next wage increase
  29. Performers and sole traders find it hard to get JobKeeper in part because they get behind on their paperwork
  30. Don't blame COVID-19: Target's decline is part of a deeper trend
  31. What defines casual work? Federal Court ruling highlights a fundamental flaw in Australian labour law
  32. Vital Signs: Australian barley growers are the victims of weaponised trade rules
  33. Rich and poor don't recover equally from epidemics. Rebuilding fairly will be a global challenge
  34. Tonight we riot? What Nintendo's 'revolutionary' video game misses about worker liberation
  35. Coronavirus has turned retail therapy into retail anxiety – keeping customers calm will be key to carrying on
  36. When the Coronavirus Supplement stops, JobSeeker needs to increase by $185 a week
  37. Recessions scar young people their entire lives, even into retirement
  38. The pieces of Australia post-coronavirus are falling into place
  39. China used anti-dumping rules against us because what goes around comes around
  40. Further to fall, harder to rise: Australia must outperform to come out even from COVID-19
  41. The big stimulus spending has just begun. Here's how to get it right, quickly
  42. How to survive a crisis: what Virgin Australia staff can learn from ex-Ansett workers
  43. Forget work-life balance – it's all about integration in the age of COVID-19
  44. Economists back social distancing 34-9 in new Economic Society-Conversation survey
  45. Self-employed Australians' hours have fallen 32% since coronavirus hit – double the impact on all employees
  46. The costs of the shutdown are overestimated -- they're outweighed by its $1 trillion benefit
  47. Vital Signs: rules are also signals, which is why easing social distancing is such a problem
  48. New Zealand's pandemic budget is all about saving and creating jobs. Now the hard work begins
  49. Will New Zealand's $50 billion budget boost Jacinda Ardern's chance of being re-elected?
  50. What'll happen when the money's snatched back? Our looming coronavirus support cliff