Deborah Palma: Brazil at a Historical Crossroads

Corruption, taxes, and authoritarian labor shackles.

Brazil finds itself at a historical crossroads that demands a rigorous analysis of its institutional structures. The release of the 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), record-breaking data from the Impostômetro, and the persistence of an authoritarian labor framework expose a system of economic asphyxiation and moral erosion. The State, under the pretext of protecting the citizen, in reality hinders their initiative, their property, and their future.

David R. Henderson: Why Economic Freedom Matters

A global status report on the elements of broad well-being.

Each year the Economic Freedom of the World report does something important: it measures whether ordinary people are allowed to make economic choices—work, save, start a business, trade, invest, and keep what they earn—without being pushed around by the government. The newest edition, published in 2025 by the Fraser Institute’s global network, compiles data through 2023 and ranks 165 jurisdictions.

Paul McDonnold: What Zimbabwe Can Learn From Chile - A Tale of Two Data Series

In 1988, when Robert Lawson was a first-year economics graduate student at Florida State University, he was surprised one day to look up and see Dr. James D. Gwartney standing in front of him. He had come down from a different floor of the Bellamy Building to find Lawson. That was unusual, because grad students were normally summoned by tenured professors, not sought out by them.

David R. Henderson: Giving Thanks for Freedom and Growth

Economic liberty is the foundation of our better lives.

"Why did men die of hunger, for six thousand years? Why did they walk, and carry goods and other men on their backs, for six thousand years, and suddenly, in one century, only on a sixth of this earth’s surface, they make steamships, railroads, motors, and are now flying around the earth in its utmost heights of air? Why did families live thousands of years in floorless hovels, without windows or chimneys, then, in eighty years and only in these United States, they are taking floors, chimneys, glass windows for granted, and regarding electric lights, porcelain toilets, and window screens as minimum necessities?"—Rose Wilder Lane, The Discovery of Freedom: Man’s Struggle against Authority, 1943

Richard Rahn from the Cato Institute: Squandering Economic Freedom

There was good news for Argentina last week. It was expected that Daniel Scioli, the Peronist candidate and political heir of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, would win the presidential election. Much to most people’s surprise, Maurico Macri, the more free-market-oriented mayor of Buenos Aires, won almost as many votes as Mr. Scioli, forcing a runoff, which Mr. Macri has a good chance to win.

The Peronists (named after former dictator Juan Peron) have had political control much of the last 70 years, and it has been a disaster for the country.

Matt Ridley: China's growth comes not from dirigisme, but from low-level freedoms

I know very little about what was discussed inside the Third Plenum of the 18th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist party. The meeting was held in secret — although one of the subjects discussed was said to be greater government transparency. About all we know is that “unprecedented” economic and social reforms were discussed, including such things as rural property rights. But, to judge by a new wave of Mao worship, persecution of dissidents and reinforced censorship, political reform is less likely than economic.

In other words, the Chinese Communist Party is trying to continue pulling off the trick that has served it ever since Deng Xiaoping defeated the Gang of Four: more economic freedom combined with less political freedom.