In his 1996 book, The Vision of the Anointed, economist Thomas Sowell sketched out a pattern that many of the "crusading movements" of the 20th century have followed. First, they identify a "great danger" to society, followed by an "urgent need" for government action "to avert impending catastrophe." A new book by psychologist and author Jonathan H…

Once upon a time, America embraced nuclear power as the future of energy. Today it accounts for a mere 18 percent of the nation's electricity generation, while fossil fuels remain dominant at 60 percent. Why did nuclear fail to take off? From 1967 to 1972, the nuclear sector experienced significant growth, and 48 new nuclear plants were built. But …

As Ronald Reagan's first budget director, former Michigan congressman David Stockman led the charge to cut the size, scope, and spending of the federal government in the early 1980s. He made enemies among Democrats by pushing hard for cuts to welfare programs—and he ultimately made enemies among his fellow Republicans by pushing equally hard to sla…

After enacting sweeping reforms in Argentina, President Javier Milei faced a major protest. Tens of thousands of people marched through the streets, hundreds of flights were grounded, and schools and businesses closed in protests to Milei's attempt to fix the troubled South American country. Milei is the first self-described libertarian head of sta…

If we all went a little nuts during the COVID-19 lockdowns, it's absolutely true that some of us—including many of our country's leaders and people in the media—went absolutely batshit crazy, often with disastrous results. Exactly why that happened is the subject of author Jon Ronson's latest season of Things Fell Apart, a podcast that explores the…

"If the problem with campus speech codes is the selectivity with which universities penalize various forms of bigotry," wrote James Kirchick recently in The New York Times, "the solution is not to expand the university's power to punish expression. It's to abolish speech codes entirely." Kirchick was writing about widespread outrage at the nuanced …

Did you know that by 2050, fully a quarter of the planet's population will reside in Africa? Yet despite abundant natural resources and a young and ambitious population, the continent remains the poorest of them all. Born in Senegal and now residing in Austin, Texas, Magatte Wade is director of the Center for African Prosperity at the Atlas Network…

During his two terms as governor of Arizona, Doug Ducey managed to pass a flat income tax with a rate of 2.5 percent, reform public sector pensions, universalize important school choice measures, reform occupational licensing rules, turn a budget deficit into a surplus, and substantially shrink the size of the government workforce. He also built a …

William D. Eggers is co-author, with Donald F. Kettl, of Bridgebuilders: How Government Can Transcend Boundaries to Solve Big Problems. He's now the executive director of Deloitte's Center for Government Insights, but 30 years ago, he ran the privatization center for Reason Foundation, the nonprofit that publishes Reason. Eggers has since worked wi…

"Was Milton Friedman the most important libertarian of them all?" Reason's Nick Gillespie asked Stanford historian Jennifer Burns during a live taping of The Reason Interview With Nick Gillespie podcast in New York City. Burns is the author of the masterful and definitive new biography of the Nobel Prize–winning economist, titled Milton Friedman: T…

Quitting is massively underrated, says Annie Duke, an author, doctor of psychology, and former professional poker player who holds a bracelet from the 2004 World Series of Poker. Her latest book is Quit: The Power of Knowing When To Walk Away. Using examples ranging from Muhammad Ali's refusal to retire from boxing earlier in his career to the over…

After their invention in the late 1800s, sneakers became a pop-culture staple by the 1970s and '80s with models like the Adidas Superstar, Puma Clyde, and Nike Air Force 1. But it wasn't until the release of the Air Jordan in 1985 that sneaker fandom became an international obsession and evolved into a disruptive shoe market. Resellers all over the…

After a dozen years of legal tussles, seven years in the crosshairs of ambitious prosecutors, and five-and-a-half years fighting a federal case that saw his business forcibly shuttered, his assets seized, and his longtime partner dead by suicide, alt-weekly newspaper impresario Michael Lacey was found guilty Thursday on just one of the 86 criminal …

"I'm under no illusion that humanity will completely eradicate the racial tribal instinct or racism or bigotry itself. But I feel that colorblindness is the North Star that we should use when making decisions," argues Coleman Hughes during a live taping of The Reason Interview with Nick Gillespie podcast in New York City. Hughes is a writer, podcas…

Behind the scenes of a traditional bathhouse in Brooklyn, something extraordinary is taking place: The pools, heated to 104 degrees, are not warmed by conventional means but by computers mining for bitcoin. A profit-seeking drive for energy efficiency has caused bitcoin miners to pop up in unexpected places, such as Jason Goodman's New York bathhou…

Swedish historian Johan Norberg is author of The Capitalist Manifesto: Why the Global Free Market Will Save the World, which caught the eye of Elon Musk, who tweeted, "This book is an excellent explanation of why capitalism is not just successful, but morally right." Norberg wrote the book to combat a growing belief on the right and the left that l…

"We've taught young people that any of their missteps or any of their heterodox opinions are grounds to tear them down. That's no way to grow up." That was journalist Rikki Schlott speaking before a sold-out crowd on Monday night at a live taping of The Reason Interview with Nick Gillespie podcast in New York City. Schlott, 23, teamed up with Greg …

About twenty-three years ago, public health officials began to notice increases in what would later be called "deaths of despair," referring to suicides, deaths from alcoholism, and drug overdoses. Public health officials and legislators responded by seeking to limit opioid prescriptions for non-cancer chronic pain. Their tactics included violent r…

Every year, over 25 million tourists flock to the iconic National Mall in Washington, D.C. Yet as they explore some of the nation's greatest museums and monuments, visitors often find themselves faced with limited dining options, which boil down to either pricey cafes at the Smithsonian museums or food trucks parked along the Mall. The food trucks …

In 2001, Danish political scientist Bjorn Lomborg burst onto the international scene with his bestselling and controversial book The Skeptical Environmentalist. The onetime member of Greenpeace said that climate change is real and that human activity is clearly contributing to it, but he said the best science didn't support the apocalyptic visions …

In 19th century America, trains symbolized modernity. Passenger rail connected the east and west coasts and helped settle the frontier. By 1916, rail accounted for 98 percent of intercity travel. As it became easier to drive or fly, passenger rail use plummeted. In 1971, the government created Amtrak, which survives on federal subsidies. And most r…

Erika Dyck is a professor at the University of Saskatchewan who studies the history of psychedelics with a special interest in the legacy of Humphry Osmond, the British-born psychiatrist who coined the term pyschedelic, gave Aldous Huxley his first dose of mescaline, and conducted pathbreaking work using LSD to help alcoholics stop drinking. Among …

"I never pictured a world where marijuana would be anywhere close to legal, and it's mind-blowing to me that mushrooms are being decriminalized everywhere," says Shane Mauss, a comedian who tours the country discussing his psychedelic experiences. Reason caught up with him at the Psychedelic Science 2023 conference, held in Denver this June, where …

In June, I traveled to Denver with Zach Weismueller to cover the Psychedelic Science 2023 conference, organized by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), a group that has been working to gain Food and Drug Administration approval of MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD since the late 1980s. We produced a 30-minute documentary a…

"Welcome to the psychedelic '20s!" Rick Doblin, founder of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, or MAPS, proclaimed in his keynote speech to open the Psychedelic Science 2023 conference. At the event organized by MAPS in Denver this June, a reported 13,000 people gathered to talk about what seemed like every possible topic rel…