The September 11 attacks in New York and Washington have already cost America thousands of lives and billions of dollars in damages. But those are only the direct costs. How severe and how lasting will the impact be on our economy as whole? And how will new burdens on the federal government, including a military buildup and a bailout of the airline industry, affect fiscal policy? Should the government cut taxes or increase spending to get the economy moving again?

In the West, capitalism reigns triumphant. Living standards, wealth, and technological development in the capitalist Western countries surpass anything seen before in human history. But why has capitalism so obviously failed in most developing countries? Why are some saying that capitalism is in a state of crisis today in the Third World? Does the success of capitalism depend on Western cultural values that simply don't translate to the Third World? Or can economic and political reforms, especially reform of property rights, enable developing countries to share the same fruits of capitalism and free enterprise that we enjoy in the West?

The Hoover Institution hosted its annual Board of Overseers’ summer meeting during July 9–11, 2013.

The program began on Tuesday evening with before-dinner remarks by Paul D. Clement, a partner at Bancroft PLLC. Clement served as the forty-third solicitor general of the United States from June 2005 until June 2008. He has argued more than sixty-five cases before the US Supreme Court. During Clement’s speech, titled “Federalism in the Roberts Court,” he talked about the revitalization of federalism in the Rehnquist court “imposing some limits on the federal government’s power vis-a-vis the states.”

Richard Epstein the Peter and Kirsten Bedford Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, looks at the proper role of government in responding to natural disasters, including a consideration of state-subsidized insurance and price gouging during times of crisis.

Richard Epstein, the Peter and Kirsten Bedford Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a member of its Property Rights, Freedom, and Prosperity Task Force, notes that the conscious decision to make Apple the focal point of a special investigation offers a bittersweet commentary on the fragile state of the US political economy.

Rupert Murdoch weighs in on capitalism, China, Google, and more. . . .

AUDIO ONLY

Peter Robinson and Stephen Kotkin discuss Trump’s response to the COVID-19 crisis, Kotkin’s thoughts on the Chinese leadership class and the advantages they may seek to exploit, and which country—China or the United States—will come to represent the more successful or compelling model to other nations.

Analyzing the global financial crisis and its aftermath in the United States and the United Kingdom with Kevin Warsh and George Osborne.

Supplementing his weekly column “The Libertarian,” which appears in the Hoover Institution’s Defining Ideas, Hoover Institution senior fellow Richard Epstein posted his first Libertarian podcast on January 21, 2013.