Cowen (2020) argues for a redirection of effort towards “State Capacity Libertarianism,” which keeps the core of policy proposals from libertarianism intact while emphasizing a select set of policies aimed at furthering economic growth. These policies center on the ability of the state to...

A large literature has found positive associations between economic freedom and income, growth, and a variety of other desirable outcomes. This paper surveys the literature that seeks to explain the causes of economic freedom. Some of the most consistent findings in this literature are that...

A large empirical literature has found positive effects of economic freedom on economic outcomes, such as output and per capita growth. However, several variables in the index are very likely to decline in conjunction with recessions. In the absence of these variables, does the well-studied...

This paper uses newly gathered and available data and autoregressive methods to create an economic freedom index for the 1950s and 1960s for up to 95 countries. This index is designed to be as compatible as possible with the Economic Freedom of the World (EFW) index published annually by the...

<I>Economic Freedom of the World</I>, an economic index published by the Fraser Institute, has seen wide use inside and outside academia. Certain data issues arise, however, when complete data are unavailable. This paper proposes to mitigate or eliminate many of these issues by filling in the missing...</i>

There is an extensive literature on the presence of valuable natural resources creating a competition for control of central states and resource rents. This mechanism has been argued to be an important underlying factor preventing certain countries from acquiring good institutions and achieving...