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In Episode 199 of the Let People Prosper Show, Vance Ginn interviews Patrick McLaughlin of the Hoover Institution about how regulation affects transportation, freight costs, and economic growth.
The discussion explores how regulatory accumulation functions as a hidden tax across the economy, raising prices for consumers while slowing productivity and investment. They also discuss freight transportation, supply chain efficiency, the response to the East Palestine derailment, and why policymakers should focus on measurable, outcome-based regulation rather than symbolic mandates. This episode highlights why transportation and regulatory policy matter far more to everyday affordability than most people realize. Listen on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify. Show notes on Substack.
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 Originally published at The Daily Economy. A recent cyberattack on the University of Mississippi Medical Center shut down clinic operations for nine days, disrupting appointments and access to care across Mississippi. According to the center’s own official system update, scheduling, communications, and clinical workflows were all impacted. Nine days without normal access to care is not just a cybersecurity problem. It is a market structure problem. The University of Mississippi Medical Center is not simply another hospital. It is Mississippi’s only academic medical center and serves as the state’s primary hub for specialty care, physician training, and complex services. By its own description, it provides levels of care “unavailable anywhere else in the state.” That concentration means when UMMC goes down, much of Mississippi’s advanced care capacity goes down with it. In a competitive system, that should not happen. When a major provider in most industries goes offline, others step in. Capacity shifts. Customers reroute. The system bends but does not break. In Mississippi, it broke. A System Built to Concentrate That fragility is not an accident. It is the result of policy. Mississippi has long enforced certificate-of-need laws that require government approval before new hospitals, surgical centers, or major medical services can open or expand. These laws are often justified as cost-control measures. In practice, they limit entry and protect incumbents. Mississippi’s version is among the more restrictive. Applications can cost tens of thousands of dollars, and existing providers are allowed to challenge potential competitors. The effect is predictable. Fewer entrants. Slower expansion. Less redundancy. Policy analysis by the Mississippi Center for Public Policy found that, without CON restrictions, Mississippi could have supported 30 percent more rural hospitals and 13 percent more ambulatory surgical centers, thereby increasing access in underserved areas. A comparable state without such restrictions would have roughly 165 hospitals, compared with Mississippi’s 116, a difference of more than 30 percent in total capacity in 2017. That missing capacity matters most when something goes wrong. Fragility Has Consequences The cyberattack did not create Mississippi’s access problem. It exposed it. When a single institution serves as the backbone of a state’s healthcare system, any disruption becomes systemic. Patients do not simply go elsewhere. In many cases, there is nowhere else to go. That means delayed diagnoses, postponed treatments, and worsening conditions. It means longer wait times in an already strained system. And in extreme cases, it can mean preventable harm. Across the country, wait times for physician appointments are already rising, particularly for primary and specialty care. Systems with limited competition are less able to absorb shocks, making those delays even more severe when disruptions occur. This is what lack of competition looks like in practice. Not just higher prices, but reduced resilience. The Financing Problem Market structure is only part of the story. The way healthcare is financed amplifies the problem. Most healthcare dollars do not flow through patients. They flow through insurers, employers, and government programs. That disconnect weakens the most important signal in any market: price. When patients are not paying out of pocket, providers compete less on value and more on navigating reimbursement systems. Administrative costs rise. Innovation slows. Capacity becomes rigid rather than responsive. This is the core issue identified in the Empower Patients framework. Healthcare in the United States is dominated by third-party control rather than patient decision-making. The result is a system that is both expensive and fragile. What Competition Looks Like When competition is allowed, the results differ. Transparent providers such as the Surgery Center of Oklahoma publish prices upfront and often deliver care at significantly lower cost than traditional hospital systems. Direct Primary Care practices offer faster access, longer visits, and predictable pricing by operating outside insurance billing. These models do more than reduce costs. They add capacity. They create alternatives. They make the system more resilient. If one provider goes offline, others are available. Mississippi has fewer alternatives because policy has limited their growth. Even when regulators approved a new hospital in Biloxi, the process revealed how difficult it is to add capacity. The state issued a certificate of need in 2012 for a replacement facility, but incumbent hospitals sued to block the project, delaying it for years, arguing it was not a true replacement. That prolonged fight stemmed from the original plan to build a new hospital to replace Gulf Coast Medical Center after it was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. In short, even obvious community needs can be slowed by legal challenges from existing providers. The pattern continues: recent consolidation has further strengthened dominant systems on the Gulf Coast, and policymakers pursue only incremental changes to certificate-of-need laws, while others call for a broader overhaul of the state’s restrictions.  A map depicting states where an incumbent competitor may object to a new facility. Image credit: The Mississippi Center for Public Policy. A Warning for Policymakers The Mississippi cyberattack should be viewed as a warning, not an anomaly. It revealed how vulnerable a healthcare system becomes when competition is restricted and capacity is concentrated. What looks efficient on paper can be fragile in practice. Mississippi is not an outlier. 35 states and DC operate under certificate-of-need laws that limit the number of new providers and expansion. States have been working to improve their CON laws, reflecting a growing recognition that the current structure is too rigid. But incremental reform will not solve a structural problem. A Better Path Forward A more resilient healthcare system that empowers patients requires more than cybersecurity upgrades. It requires policy change. First, remove barriers to entry that prevent new providers from entering the market. In Mississippi, the state could support 30 percent more rural hospitals and 13 percent more ambulatory surgical centers, meaning more options for patients and more capacity when disruptions occur. Second, shift financing toward patient control. When individuals manage their own healthcare dollars, they have an incentive to seek value, compare options, and demand better service. Third, reduce regulatory burdens that divert resources from care to compliance. These changes would not only lower costs. They would make the system stronger.  The Real Lesson
Mississippi’s healthcare system did not fail because of a cyberattack alone. It failed because it lacked the flexibility and redundancy to respond. One hospital system should never be a single point of failure for an entire state. The way to prevent that is not more centralization. It is more competition, more capacity, and more patient control. That is the lesson Mississippi offers — and it is one policymakers across the country should take seriously.  Originally published on Substack. The late, great economist Milton Friedman used to remind us that one of the great mistakes in public policy is judging programs by their intentions instead of their results. That is the right test for the new SNAP restrictions spreading under the MAHA banner.  The stated goal is healthier choices. The early result is a bureaucratic maze that treats low-income adults like children, burdens retailers, and substitutes political nutrition theories for dignity and common sense. The fresh Washington Post reporting is the real tell. Across nearly two dozen states with approved waivers, and ten already implementing them as of the report, recipients and retailers are running into a patchwork of rules that is inconsistent, counterintuitive, and hard to administer. That is not a side effect. It is what happens when government tries to micromanage millions of grocery decisions from above. The Knowledge Problem This is another economic titan Friedrich Hayek who coined the “knowledge problem,” which is now being realized in a grocery cart.  In Idaho, KitKats and Twix were allowed because they contain flour, while other candy was banned. In Iowa, the Post reported that one mother’s sweetened sparkling water and semisweet baking chips were rejected while chips and cookies still went through. Some cold sandwiches may qualify or not depending on details that ordinary families cannot possibly track in real time, and retailers told the Post that even Pedialyte was excluded under the state’s rules. That is not serious nutrition policy. That is bureaucratic absurdity. When politicians and agencies try to define “healthy” one product at a time, they do not create clarity. They create loopholes, contradictions, and arbitrary line-drawing. The result is exactly what Friedman warned about: a system run by people who do not bear the costs of the mistakes they make. A Tax on Small Retailers This is not just paternalism. It is an administrative tax. The Post reported that some states did not provide product-code lists, leaving retailers to guess or to buy third-party lists that can cost thousands of dollars. In West Virginia, the state said even buying a one-time list to give retailers was “cost prohibitive” at $130,000. In Oklahoma, one nonprofit grocer said SNAP accounted for about 60 percent of total sales, which means compliance mistakes are not trivial. They threaten the business itself. This is how government makes life more expensive without calling it a tax. Stores have to update systems, train employees, sort through vague rules, and worry about losing authorization if they get something wrong. USDA told the Post it would initially avoid penalizing minor mistakes, but after a 90-day runway enforcement had already begun in at least five states. That kind of uncertainty falls hardest on smaller retailers, especially those serving poorer neighborhoods. Picking Winners and Losers These rules also end up picking winners and losers in ways that have little to do with health. USDA’s waiver tracker shows that all 22 approved states restricted certain drinks, while 14 also restricted candy, but the definitions vary from state to state.  Some rules focus on soda, some on candy, some on sales-tax treatment, and some on broader categories of desserts or sweetened beverages. That means the same family can face different rules depending on where they live, and suppliers can be advantaged or disadvantaged based on arbitrary classifications.
That is not a neutral safety net. It is political consumer management. The Dignity Problem The most revealing part of the Post story was not economic. It was human. Recipients described being surprised, embarrassed, and stigmatized at checkout. One participant in Oklahoma said rejected items had to be put back. Others joined a lawsuit challenging the changes in five states, arguing the rules are unlawful and harmful to vulnerable households. Supporters of the restrictions say the policies should be tested and measured. Fair enough. But if the early rollout is already producing confusion and humiliation without clear evidence of better outcomes, that should give policymakers pause. True dignity does not come from a government-approved shopping cart. It comes from being able to earn, provide, and choose for yourself. The Bigger Administrative State This is part of a larger pattern. The National Conference of State Legislatures reports that more than 100 MAHA-related state measures were introduced in 2025, including efforts to restrict SNAP purchases and regulate food ingredients and additives. At the federal level, the FDA’s 2026 food priorities include several MAHA-related deliverables. Whatever one thinks of the health goals, the practical reality is obvious: government is layering more administration, more compliance, and more politics onto one more part of daily life. And as the progressive group CBPP has warned in a broader SNAP context, administrative burdens matter. Complexity can lead to delays, confusion, and people losing access to benefits they are eligible for. Even people who support nutrition reform should understand that adding friction is not costless. The Better Standard If policymakers really care about health, they should use Friedman’s standard and ask what actually works. Does this policy improve health outcomes in a way that justifies the confusion, stigma, compliance costs, and arbitrary classifications? Or is it mostly another case of government trying to play parent with other people’s lives while avoiding the harder work of promoting self-sufficiency, income growth, and real upward mobility? Government is a poor parent, a clumsy nutritionist, and an expensive helper. The better North Star is not more checkout-line supervision. It is helping people get to the point where they can buy what they want with their own earned income and live with the consequences as free adults. Three Takeaways for Policymakers 1. Good intentions are not enough. The early evidence shows state SNAP restrictions are creating confusing and counterintuitive checkout rules, not clear nutrition standards. 2. Administrative burdens are real costs. Retailers face system changes, compliance risks, and in some cases thousands of dollars in added costs, while states themselves are struggling with implementation. 3. Dignity should matter more. A policy that increases stigma and confusion without clear evidence of better outcomes deserves much more skepticism than it has gotten so far. Artificial intelligence is transforming the economy—but the policy response may be doing more harm than good.
In Episode 194 of the Let People Prosper Show, I sit down with Logan Kolas of the American Consumer Institute to examine the surge in state-level AI regulation and what it means for innovation, competition, and consumer welfare. As lawmakers across the country rush to regulate AI, many are creating a fragmented patchwork of rules that risk increasing costs, slowing technological progress, and limiting opportunity. This episode explores why these policies often miss the mark and what a more effective, pro-growth framework could look like. If the United States wants to lead in AI while protecting consumers, it will need policies grounded in sound economics—not fear-driven regulation. 👉 Learn more: https://vanceginn.com 👉 Show notes: https://vanceginn.substack.com/p/51c930fb-1357-4a44-9436-fdf915f651ad Subscribe for more conversations on economics, policy, and how to let people prosper.  Originally published on Substack. Most Americans do not wake up thinking about regulation. They think about grocery bills, utility costs, insurance premiums, housing prices, the permit that takes too long, the form that makes no sense, and the feeling that everything in life is harder and more expensive than it should be. That is regulation. It is not just some abstract fight in Washington. It shows up in the prices we pay, the jobs that never materialize, the businesses that never open, the homes that never get built, and the choices we are no longer trusted to make for ourselves. The latest Ten Thousand Commandments 2026 by the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s initial estimates that federal regulation imposes at least $2.1 trillion in annual compliance costs and economic effects, while noting that the true burden is likely much higher. That is not some rounding error. CEI estimates that the average U.S. household pays about $15,859 per year in a hidden regulatory tax. That amounts to about 15 percent of income and 20 percent of household expenses. The report says that burden exceeds what households spend on health care, food, transportation, entertainment, apparel, services, and savings. Only housing costs more. In other words, regulation is not just a business problem. It is one of the largest costs in everyday American life. The Hidden Tax Politicians love to talk about taxes because taxes are visible. You see the withholding. You file the return. You know the government took your money. Regulation is more deceptive. It usually does not arrive as a bill from the IRS. It arrives as higher prices, fewer choices, more delays, lower wages, and more time wasted navigating bureaucracy. Businesses absorb the compliance burden first, but they do not keep it. It gets passed through to workers, consumers, and investors. That is why regulation often acts like a tax that was never openly debated and never honestly priced. CEI notes that its $2.153 trillion regulatory burden rivals the $2.426 trillion collected in individual income taxes in 2024 and stands at more than four times corporate income tax collections.  That should alarm anyone who cares about affordability.
Rules Replacing Laws This is not just an economic problem. It is a constitutional one. In 2025, federal agencies issued 2,441 final rules while Congress enacted just 133 laws. That means agencies issued rules at a pace of 18 for every law passed by elected lawmakers. CEI’s Unconstitutionality Index shows the 10-year average is 22 rules for every law. That is not self-government in any serious sense. That is bureaucratic lawmaking replacing representative lawmaking. And that replacement has been building for decades. Since 1976, federal agencies have issued 223,623 final rules. Since 1993, when CEI first began publishing this report, agencies have issued 126,536 final rules. Washington is governing more and more of American life through agency command rather than legislative accountability. Paperwork Is Policy Too A lot of regulation does not even look dramatic. It looks like paperwork. It is reporting, disclosure, certification, duplication, delay, and procedural nonsense that drains time and energy out of productive life. CEI highlights 10.5 billion paperwork hours from the federal government’s own accounting, the equivalent of nearly 14,983 human lifetimes. That is not protecting the public. That is pulling talent and time away from work, production, and family life to feed bureaucracy. This is how regulation encumbers daily life. It turns permission into the default and freedom into the exception. Real Progress, Limited Progress The report does show meaningful progress in 2025. Agencies issued 2,441 final rules, the lowest tally on record. The Federal Register dropped 43 percent, from 106,109 pages in Biden’s final year to 60,917 pages in 2025. The administration also used the Congressional Review Act aggressively, signing 22 resolutions of disapproval, more than all prior enacted CRA resolutions combined. OMB’s year-end accounting under Executive Order 14192 also reported 646 deregulatory actions and five significant regulatory actions, for a ratio of 129-to-1. Good. Keep going. But let’s not oversell it. CEI is clear that the broader aggregate burden is essentially unchanged because modest annualized savings are being offset by inflation applied to the legacy regulatory state. It also notes that Congress still has not delivered the structural reforms needed to make deregulation durable. A good year of executive cleanup does not erase a century of delegated power, embedded mandates, and administrative sprawl. What Needs to Happen That is why the real fix has to be structural, not episodic. Congress should reclaim authority over major rulemaking. A regulatory budget would force agencies to live under a cap just as lawmakers are supposed to do with fiscal spending. The REINS-style approach of requiring congressional approval for major rules would restore accountability. Rules should sunset unless affirmatively renewed. And the White House should be required to produce honest aggregate cost estimates under the Regulatory Right-to-Know framework instead of letting the biggest hidden tax in America remain half-accounted for. If Congress wants less regulation, it should stop outsourcing lawmaking to agencies and then pretending not to notice the cost. Three Takeaways for Policymakers 1. Regulation is a hidden tax on everyday life. Federal regulation costs at least $2.153 trillion annually, or about $15,859 per household. 2. Bureaucrats are making too much law. Agencies issued 18 rules for every law Congress passed in 2025, and the 10-year average is 22-to-1. 3. Durable reform requires Congress, not just presidents. A lower rule count is good, but only structural reforms like a regulatory budget, congressional approval of major rules, and sunsetting can truly rightsize Washington. The administrative state does not just live in Washington. It lives in your prices, your paperwork, your delays, your shrinking choices, and your lost opportunities. That is why this fight matters. Let people prosper!  Originally published on Substack.
A growing number of lawmakers are convinced they’ve found the culprit behind rising teen anxiety and depression: the smartphone. Much of that momentum traces back to the work of Jonathan Haidt, especially in his book, The Anxious Generation, which argues that the rapid adoption of smartphones and social media has rewired childhood and driven a mental health crisis. It’s a compelling narrative. It’s also incomplete. Correlation is not causation. And building sweeping public policy around a single explanatory variable—“the phone did it”—is a serious mistake. The Data Question We’re Not Asking Yes, teen depression has risen over the past decade. But so have other major disruptions:
Smartphones were present. So were all of those forces. Even within academic research, the strength of the link between social media use and mental health varies. Some studies find modest associations. Others find effects that shrink considerably when controlling for broader factors. That doesn’t invalidate Haidt’s concerns. It simply means the causal chain is far more complex than a single device. Public policy that assumes monocausality in a multivariable world usually backfires. States Racing Ahead Anyway Despite these open questions, states are moving fast. In Wisconsin, Assembly Bill 962 would require app stores to verify user ages and obtain parental consent before minors download apps. A Senate companion, SB 937, has also been introduced. In Colorado, SB26-051 is advancing in the Senate Business, Labor, & Technology Committee. In Georgia, SB 467 would impose age verification and parental consent requirements statewide. In South Dakota, HB 1275 introduces strict verification mandates. In Alabama, HB 161 has already passed the Senate with amendments setting an effective date of January 2027 and is moving toward final action. Other states are in motion as well. In Florida, SB 1722 advanced out of the Senate Commerce and Tourism Committee. In Virginia, SB 237 was continued to the 2027 session for further study. The common thread: lawmakers are mandating App Store (think Apple or Google app stores)–level age verification systems as a frontline solution to youth mental health concerns. That leap—from social science debate to sweeping compliance regime—deserves scrutiny. What These Bills Actually Do These proposals don’t simply encourage parental involvement. They require app stores to build age-verification infrastructure that may include digital ID systems, sensitive data collection, and centralized permission frameworks. That creates several problems. First, privacy. Verifying age at scale often means collecting government IDs or other personal data. That information must be stored, secured, and protected. Data breaches are not hypothetical—they are routine. Second, speech. Age-verification systems can burden lawful access to information. Courts have historically treated such requirements cautiously when they chill First Amendment–protected activity. Third, competition. Compliance costs disproportionately favor the largest tech platforms. Smaller developers and startups will struggle to navigate a patchwork of state mandates. Ironically, policies framed as curbing “Big Tech” may entrench it. And none of this directly proves the underlying premise—that restricting app downloads will materially improve teen mental health outcomes. The Better Question If the goal is to empower families, why not focus directly on parents? Device-level parental controls already exist and continue to improve. Platforms can increase transparency tools without mandatory ID regimes. Schools can integrate digital literacy education. Law enforcement can target unlawful exploitation and abuse directly. Florida is already championing this approach. Those approaches strengthen families without constructing centralized verification systems. The uncomfortable truth is that no statute replaces engaged parenting. No compliance checklist solves cultural fragmentation or social isolation. Smartphones are tools. Like any tool, they can be misused. But they are also gateways to education, creativity, entrepreneurship, and connection. Reducing a complex mental health trend to a single device risks misdiagnosing the problem—and institutionalizing the wrong solution. Slow Down Before You Regulate When multiple states rush into digital ID mandates based on contested correlations, litigation is almost inevitable. Policy reversals are messy. Infrastructure, once built, rarely shrinks. Protecting children is a legitimate public concern. But good intentions do not justify poorly designed mandates. Lawmakers should ask harder questions:
The answer to teen mental health challenges will not be found in a single bill number. Before turning smartphones into the villain, policymakers should remember a simple principle: complex social problems rarely yield to simple regulatory fixes. Empower parents. Encourage innovation. Protect constitutional boundaries. That’s a more durable path than central planning disguised as child protection.  Originally published on Substack. Artificial intelligence isn’t an existential threat. It’s not magic, and it’s not going to swallow society whole. AI is simply advanced computing, the next logical extension of tools humans have been building for thousands of years. Yet politicians—especially here in Texas—are treating AI as if it’s a radioactive substance that must be contained through sweeping regulation. State Senator Angela Paxton and a few colleagues recently urged Congress to reject a federal “moratorium” on state AI laws, claiming Texas has taken “important steps” to protect children and consumers. Their letter and justification can be seen in her tweet.  I understand the desire to protect kids. I’m a dad of three. But overregulating technology out of fear—and surrendering parental authority to capitols—only creates bigger problems. The Texas AI laws passed last session weren’t “responsible.” They were a case study in correlation-over-causation thinking, moral panic, and political control dressed up as child protection.
This is why a federal pause, though not ideal, is needed. Texas Isn’t Protecting Families. It’s Expanding Government. Texas’s AI bills created vague liability standards, broad mandates, and bureaucratic authority with almost zero grounding in sound economics or constitutional limits. These laws shift decision-making away from parents and toward politicians and regulators—the opposite of what a free society demands. Illegal acts using AI—fraud, exploitation, child endangerment—are already illegal under decades of existing statutes. We punish outcomes, not inputs. We don’t ban cars because someone might speed. We don’t ban pencils because someone wrote something awful. Yet Texas is regulating AI as if every computing tool is a pre-crime device. This is not classical liberalism or the limited-government Texas Model I defend in my work at Ginn Economic Consulting and my research on economic freedom. It is paternalism that undermines parents, weakens competition, and slows innovation. The Precautionary Principle Isn’t Prudence—It’s Paralysis Texas lawmakers are leaning heavily on the flawed precautionary principle: regulate now “just in case.” But public policy driven by hypothetical harm consistently produces:
If applied historically, this principle would have stopped electricity, airplanes, automobiles, calculators, and the internet. Every transformative technology looked scary before it became essential. AI is no different—unless government freezes it in place. Freedom—not fear—is the best safeguard. AI Is a Complement, Not a Substitute, If Politicians Let It Be Much of the panic ignores basic economics. Automation enhances human productivity. It creates new jobs, new opportunities, and new industries—as I’ve explained repeatedly in my work on economic growth and technology. AI can empower:
Politicians frame AI as a threat to children and jobs. In reality, political overreach is the threat—not the technology. Why a Federal Moratorium Is Necessary—for Now I’m no fan of Washington micromanagement. But when states begin passing contradictory, constitutionally questionable laws that strangle interstate commerce and innovation, a temporary federal pause becomes the lesser evil. Otherwise, the U.S. will repeat the disaster of California’s CAFE standards, where one state distorted the entire nation’s auto market and made cares more expensive for everyone. A patchwork of 50 incompatible AI regimes would be even worse. AI isn’t a local zoning matter. It’s core to:
A short-term federal moratorium is not about controlling AI—it’s about preventing states from crippling innovation before the country fully understands the technology. Meanwhile, China Isn’t Slowing Down While Texas and other states push fear-based restrictions, China continues racing ahead in AI and robotics. But as the Wall Street Journal recently noted in a recent piece on China’s robot boom, the appearance of progress masks deep structural problems. Their surge in automation reflects demographic decline, state coercion, and misallocated capital. Still, Beijing is moving fast, and America will not win by second-guessing ourselves to death. As I argued in my recent commentary on China’s misguided industrial push, America’s strength isn’t central planning—it’s free people, free markets, and open competition. We don’t beat China by copying their control. We beat China by unleashing our creativity. My Take Texas lawmakers mean well, but they’re wrong. Overregulating AI today will harm:
The federal moratorium is a temporary brake on a runaway train of fear-based policymaking. Texas should use this moment to peel back its flawed AI rules and return to the pro-growth, limited-government principles that once made this state the envy of the world. AI is part of our future. Liberty—not regulation—is the best way to shape it. Let’s get back to trusting people, empowering parents, and letting innovation drive prosperity. That’s how we let people prosper—even in the age of AI.  Originally published on Substack.
The federal government finally reopened — on my 44th birthday (Nov. 12), no less — after the longest government shutdown in American history. Forty-three days of drama, political brinkmanship, and leadership failures from both parties ended with a massive spending deal that…cut no spending, kept Biden’s bloated post-COVID spending levels, but preserved the provisions in the so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill”: expanded Obamacare subsidies that were supposed to expire years ago when Biden ended the emergency declaration but now represent $1.5 trillion in new spending over a decade. In other words: Congress ended the shutdown by agreeing to spend more with continued trillions of dollars in deficits…to avoid talking about spending. But somehow, in the middle of all this dysfunction, they did find one thing they could agree on: A nationwide ban on hemp-derived THC products starting a year from now. Yes — the government that can’t pass a real budget and running $2 trillion deficits for a $38 trillion national debt that’s 120% of GDP suddenly found laser-like focus when it came to shutting down an entire estimated $28 billion industry, destroying more than 300,000 jobs, and throwing thousands of small businesses under the regulatory bus. As I’ve been saying for years: When politicians panic, liberty is the first casualty. The Ban: A Disaster Wrapped Inside a Spending Bill Tucked into the agriculture portion of the spending package was a provision banning any hemp-derived consumer product containing more than 0.4 mg of THC per container — far below what many products contains. For context:
The ban takes effect one year from passage — unless Congress reverses course. That means the clock is already ticking. And as always, when government swings a hammer, real people get crushed:
The result? More crime. More cartels. More Al Capones. And less safety, less transparency, and less personal responsibility. Thank You, U.S. Sen. Rand Paul — One Who Tried Let’s be clear: not every Republican supported this nonsense. US Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) offered an amendment to strike the hemp ban outright. It was the right move — grounded in constitutional principles, federalism, and basic economic sanity. He deserves credit for standing firm for small businesses, property rights, and individual liberty. But most of the Senate ignored him and voted for prohibition anyway — many of whom preach “limited government” while voting like central planners. Ask yourself: Are lawmakers protecting public safety…or protecting alcohol lobbyists who don’t want competition Because this looks less like moral conviction and more like the oldest story in politics: Baptists and Bootleggers working together. Economics 101: There’s No Market Failure Here For government to intervene in a market, there must be a clear, demonstrable market failure — something the private sector cannot solve. That simply doesn’t apply here. There is no imbalance of information: consumers know what a THC gummy is. There is no externality beyond personal choices: adults consume responsibly or not, like alcohol, caffeine, or Tylenol. There is no monopoly requiring intervention: the hemp market is one of the most competitive sectors in America. What we have instead is a classic case of politicians treating adults like children and industries like political bargaining chips. Prohibition is not regulation. Prohibition is not safety. Prohibition is not limited government. Prohibition is force — and force fails every time. The Real Path Forward: Freedom, Federalism, and Civil Society If Congress wants to keep communities safe and entrepreneurs accountable, here’s the path: 1. Legalize and Decriminalize, Don’t Criminalize and Ban Prohibition empowers criminals, cartels, and fentanyl. Legal markets empower consumers, safety, transparency, and competition. 2. State-Level Regulation, not Bans, Work Better Hemp is overwhelmingly a local and intrastate industry — making it a textbook case for federalism. Let states set testing standards, retail rules, and age limitations, not bans like Texas tried this year and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott vetoed and issued an executive order for 21+ purchases and not near sensitive locations like schools (should be legislation instead of EO as executives are getting too much power these days among populists). 3. Civil Society > Federal Bureaucracy Addiction and misuse require family support, churches, nonprofits, mental-health expertise, and community care — not another round of federal raids or one-size-fits-all bans. 4. Respect Adults, Respect Markets Consumers deserve choice. Entrepreneurs deserve opportunity. Liberty requires both. Conclusion: If Congress Won’t Protect Liberty, We Must This entire episode — the shutdown, the spending bill, the hemp ban — reveals a simple truth: Washington will spend endlessly, regulate recklessly, and ban freely unless the American people push back. But there is good news: Liberty is resilient. Entrepreneurs are resilient. And Americans overwhelmingly prefer freedom over prohibition. The hemp ban doesn’t take effect for one full year. That means now is the time — for advocacy, legislation, litigation, and education. And as someone who’s spent his career fighting for pro-growth, pro-freedom, pro-prosperity policy, I can tell you: This fight is winnable. Let’s get to work. — Vance Ginn, Ph.D.  Originally published at The Daily Economy.
Washington never misses a chance to promise “fairness” while tightening its grip on the financial system. For more than a decade, regulators and central bankers have stretched their authority far beyond the original intent of the law, distorting markets, punishing savers, and concentrating economic power in the hands of bureaucrats. The latest example is the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Section 1033 rule, which marks a new front in Washington’s quiet campaign to nationalize financial data under the guise of “consumer empowerment.” Section 1033 was intended to help consumers access their financial information. In practice, the Biden-era CFPB twisted it into a sweeping mandate that forces banks, credit unions, and fintech companies to share customer data with third parties, regardless of cost, security, or consent. Regulators call this “data portability.” But it’s really data coercion, forced transfer of private information directed by the government. By compelling institutions to open their systems to outside actors, the CFPB is creating massive cybersecurity risks and legal uncertainty. Once that data leaves a secure bank environment, who’s responsible if it’s hacked or sold? The agency doesn’t say, because it doesn’t have to. It operates as a mostly unaccountable branch of government funded by the Federal Reserve. This new rule fits a pattern that stretches across administrations of both parties. The Federal Reserve has spent years manipulating the economy through its own version of central planning. Its balance sheet exploded from about $4 trillion before the COVID lockdowns to nearly $9 trillion at the peak, and even after years of “tightening,” it still sits around $6.6 trillion, roughly 20 percent of US GDP. That extraordinary expansion, coupled with record federal deficits, monetized Washington’s overspending and triggered the inflation surge Americans are still feeling today. The Fed’s interventions distorted credit markets, inflated asset prices, and fueled the illusion that easy money could substitute for productivity. The result has been slower growth, declining real wages, and a public that no longer trusts the dollar — or the institutions that manage it. At the same time, agencies such as the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation have extended open-ended guarantees to ever-larger deposits up to $250,000, signaling to financial institutions that risk doesn’t really matter because taxpayers will always clean up the mess. The more Washington insulates these institutions from market discipline, the more reckless behavior it encourages. That’s not consumer protection; that’s moral hazard on a national scale. The CFPB’s Section 1033 rule compounds that problem by politicizing access to financial data. It hands Washington the ability to dictate not only how money moves but also how information about money moves. Once regulators can decide which companies may access data and on what terms, they effectively control the competitive landscape of American finance. This is industrial policy in digital disguise. And it’s already spilling into state politics, where legislators are introducing new caps on credit card interest rates, limits on interchange fees, and other well-intentioned but destructive interventions. Each of these measures increases costs for consumers, reduces credit access for the poor, and consolidates power among the largest incumbents who can afford the compliance burden. If this sounds like central planning, that’s because it is. A handful of bureaucrats now wield more influence over the financial system than the millions of Americans who depend on it. The Fed’s technocrats decide the cost of money. The CFPB dictates how data may flow. The FDIC guarantees risks that private firms should bear. And Congress keeps spending as if none of it matters, driving the national debt above $37 trillion and pushing annual interest payments past $1.1 trillion — a sum larger than the defense budget. These are not isolated mistakes. They are symptoms of a government that has grown far beyond its competence. The path forward begins with humility and a return to first principles. The Fed should stop acting as an unelected economic czar and start shrinking its balance sheet toward historical norms, or possibly back to six percent of GDP, where it was before the Great Financial Crisis. Congress should reassert its oversight role and restore a rules-based monetary framework that ties money growth to economic fundamentals, not political convenience. The CFPB should be dismantled or at least stripped of its unilateral authority, with legitimate fraud enforcement consolidated under accountable agencies. Most importantly, Washington must end its obsession with managing markets and start trusting them again. America’s prosperity was built on sound money, competition, and personal responsibility — not on bureaucratic control. If we want a financial system that works for everyone, we must end the centralization of both money and data. Section 1033 isn’t just another bad rule; it’s a warning sign of how far we’ve drifted from a truly free economy. The stakes are simple: either Americans control their financial future, or Washington does. It’s time to choose the former.  Originally published on Substack.
America is in an insurance affordability crisis. Home and auto premiums are soaring—some up 40% or more in just two years. And instead of addressing the root causes, politicians are reaching for their favorite broken tool: price controls. According to a Wall Street Journal report, lawmakers in states like Illinois, Louisiana, and New York are rushing to cap insurance rates as families revolt against 30%–50% increases. The story is the same across red and blue states alike. Regulators want to “protect consumers” from big insurers—but their interventions are the reason affordability collapsed in the first place. The Real Causes Behind Rising Insurance Costs Let’s start with the basics. Insurance premiums reflect risk and cost. When the cost of rebuilding a home or repairing a car goes up, so do premiums. And those costs are rising not because of greed—but because of government-induced inflation, tariffs, and regulation.
It’s a vicious cycle: government interference raises costs, consumers feel the squeeze, and politicians respond with even more control. Price Controls Are the Wrong “Solution” Price caps don’t solve affordability. They destroy it. When California capped insurance premiums for decades, insurers left the state. Now its regulators are scrambling to approve double-digit rate hikes just to lure them back. Louisiana tried deregulating to attract more insurers—then flipped again, imposing “excessive rate” controls this year. The result? Confusion, fewer carriers, and a less stable market. As S&P Global analyst Tim Zawacki told the Journal, “Price controls don’t lead to affordability. Ultimately, they just chase insurers out of the market.” He’s right. You can’t legislate away risk. The only way to bring prices down is through competition, efficiency, and innovation—none of which survive when government fixes prices. Deregulation: The Real Path to Affordability If politicians truly cared about helping families, they’d focus on freeing the insurance market, not strangling it.
Trying to solve a government-caused problem with more government always fails. Affordability won’t come from mandates—it will come from markets free to adjust, compete, and innovate. The Bigger Picture: The Housing Affordability Squeeze This isn’t just about insurance. It’s about the broader housing affordability crisis. Rising premiums, property taxes, tariffs, and interest rates all share a common thread—too much government. From local building codes to federal trade policy, intervention has made housing less affordable for millions. Families don’t want subsidies or price caps—they want predictability and opportunity. They want to build, buy, and insure a home without government distortions turning every step into a financial burden. Closing Thoughts When politicians talk about “protecting consumers,” it usually means protecting themselves from political backlash. The truth is that markets—not bureaucrats—are best at setting prices and balancing risk. If we want affordable insurance and housing, we must get government out of the way, not invite it in further. Freedom—not force—creates prosperity. That’s as true for homeowners and drivers as it is for every sector of the economy. Let people prosper. |
Vance Ginn, Ph.D.
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