Adam Smith Institute

My top read this week is Squandered: How New Labour are Wasting Over One Trillion Pounds of Our Money, by David Craig (£7.64 + postage).

The UK government has increased our taxes by around £1000 billion over the last decade (that's an extra £50,000 per household). And what have we got for it? Slick, world-class health and education? A welfare system that really helps people back into work? Or a bigger, fatter, self-serving bureaucracy?

Silly question, really. David Craig's new book shows how the tsunami of extra cash (our extra cash to be precise) has been squandered by department after department. It's a triple whammy of f incompetence, cover-up and cuts. Craig exposes a story of woeful mismanagement that has produced more bureaucracy rather than better service, squandered astonishing amounts of our money, damaged our life and rewarded the person responsible with the keys to Number Ten. Would be comic if it weren't so tragic.

Learn more and buy it here.

Boris Johnson looks likely to become the next Mayor of London, but did you know that in addition to being a polished politician, he's also a serious classical scholar? Well, he's on TV, wandering through the Roman Empire in order to try to find how these extraordinary Roman folk held it all together. And to go with it there's a book, The Dream of Rome (£13.29+pp from our online bookstore – but more in the shops). As you'd expect, it's witty, politically incorrect and a good read. Browse and buy here.

My Adam Smith Institute colleague has written a new book on how (free) markets work – called, modestly, The Best Book on the Market.

It covers all the basics about choice, competition and entrepreneurship, and prices. But it's short, fun, anecdotal and accessible. So hopefully it will serve to spread the the understanding among the public, students – even politicians – that markets are actually a good thing. Indeed, the book's sub-title is How to Stop Worrying and Love the Free Economy.

John Blundell of the Institute of Economic Affairs says it vividly and simply explains competition, entrepreneurship and prices. Václav Klaus, President of Czech Republic, says that it presents solid arguments against government attempts to 'perfect' markets by obstructing competition and private ownership. And former Chancellor Lord Lawson says Anything which educates the public and politicians on how the free economy actually works is always welcome. Dr Butler does this in style. And the book has received many more plaudits from round the world.

It's being published internationally by Capstone (Wiley's business/popular imprint) on 18 April, but you can pre-order it here. Go on – you know you want to!

Freedom 101, the recently published compilation of all 101 of Dr Madsen Pirie's Common Errors, is now available on Amazon for the bargain price of £4.79.

The book refutes many of the common errors of economic, political and social debate. Many of them are in daily circulation as if they were truisms. We are told that, 'the world is running out of scarce resources' or that, 'we should protect the poor by fixing the price of essential goods'. But as Madsen shows, some of these are based on errors of fact, some on false arguments, and many of them on a misunderstanding of how economics works. The book is designed to help readers clarify their own thoughts and equip them to bring that same clarity to aid the understanding of others in discussion and debate.

Click here for the Amazon page.

Iain Dale's published his list of the 75 top political books. He's a UK based politician and journalist, so no surprise that most of them are indeed about the UK. It's possible that I'm quibbling a bit when I decry the list as being jam packed to the rafters with descriptions of what it is that politicians do (or have done). I agree that for many this is what politics is, but I'm afraid I regard it as the entirely uninteresting part of the whole process. As with Bismark's comment about the making of both laws and sausages: I'm interested in why people make sausages and what the end result is like, but I really can't work up any fascination about who is turning the meat grinder, nor whether they are wheeling it clockwise or anti-.

However, if you really are interested in the lawmaking process there's only one book worth reading: PJ O'Rourke's "Parliament of Whores". While a little dated now it's an unflatteringly honest description of how the process actually works. It might even persuade you of my own point of view: one of the more morally honest things that Mr, Spitzer did was his interaction with Ashley Dupre.

As to why we have this system, as to why politics exists at all and we do try to make laws, then there's nothing better than Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations". Yes, those hundreds upon hundreds of pages of 18 th century prose. For what the end result can all too often turn out to be, try "The Road to Serfdom" by Freddie Hayek.

Just those three will innoculate you against either the necessity or desire to read yet another book by either an aspiring or retiring politician: "The Challenge Beyond", "Beyond the Challenge" and "Challenge the Beyond" can all remain safely unread and undisturbed upon the booksellers' shelves. You will not only understand the political process completely, you will be free to get on with more important and useful things like burping the baby, watching the footie or considering the utility of a really well made chicken balti. All of which are vastly more rewarding than the operation of the sausage grinder and similarly, vastly more interesting. 

Of the three greats of post-war science fiction, Heinlein, Clarke and Asimov, I was fortunate to meet two of them – Clarke and Asimov. The passing of Sir Arthur C Clarke, aged 90, marks the final end of that era. These were the writers who stretched the imagination and let it soar. They were the companions of my boyhood, radiating an optimism that planted itself deep.

The backdrop of their stories was that humans will always face danger and adversity, but can win through by force of character and ingenuity. They radiated the sense that humanity can solve its problems by a combination of creativity and effort; if people apply themselves they can overcome the difficulties that assail them.

Clarke himself was a futurist as much as a writer. He was more realistic than the others, in that the things he described seemed more possible and more immediate. From the geostationary TV satellite to the space elevator, his imagination created the technology of the future, and it spurred people on to help bring it about.

None of the three saw a limited future for humankind, or one where humanity learned to live within its means. On the contrary, they saw our descendents making the universe their canvas and painting an unlimited future upon it. They profoundly affected the psyche of their generation and its successors; we shared their dreams and couldn't wait for the opportunities and choices they would unfold.

Rest in peace, Sir Arthur, and thank you.

I'm currently reading the IEA's latest book, Prohibitions. Edited by John Meadowcroft, it tackles the whole range of prohibitions – from drugs and prostitution to the sale of body parts. It looks like an excellent (and timely) contribution to the public debate. You can get it here from the IEA website.

The introduction sketches out the general case against prohibition. The opening points are theoretical. Any restriction on what we are allowed to do with our own body "assigns partial ownership rights in citizens to the state", reducing individual liberty. Such prohibitions must therefore be considered very carefully, with "an assumption that government will not intervene, even if a good case for intervention can be made, other than as an absolute last resort." Without such an assumption, liberty can be gradually undermined by a series of well-intentioned and seemingly worthwhile interventions, "until it has completely disappeared."

Laws should instead be based on Mill's harm principle: the state should only prohibit things that directly harm others. Once that principle is breached, and autonomous individuals are prevented from freely choosing actions that only harm themselves, almost any intervention can be justified.

The chapter then outlines a series of practical arguments against prohibition. Firstly, prohibition places markets in criminal hands, imposing costs on the whole of society. Secondly, prohibition "increases the risk of already risky activities". Unlike legitimate corporations, drug producers have little incentive to ensure the safety of their product, and users must purchase drugs without adequate knowledge of their purity or contents. Similarly, prostitutes forced to work illegally are at much greater risk than those working in legal brothels.

Thirdly, prohibition criminalizes people who would not otherwise be criminals, by making illegal acts voluntarily undertaken by consenting adults. Fourthly, prohibitions divert police resources away from activities that actually harm third parties, imposing an opportunity cost on society and leading to higher taxes. Fifthly, prohibition increases public ignorance, making it harder for them to get the information required to assess the risks of a particular activity.

The upshot of all this is that "prohibition almost never works and is almost always counter-productive". I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the book.

On our online bookstore this week, take a look at a book just out, Privacy Wars: Who Holds Information on You and What They Do with it by Rob Hamadi (£10.44+pp).

Governments want our biometric data and the police want our Google records; banks track our spending and our movements. We are caught on CCTV cameras 300 times a day. Who exactly holds data on you – and why?  With interviews with the leading warriors on every side, including Interpol, the DoJ, Equifax and Microsoft, Privacy Wars gives a first-hand account of how the battle is going.

Buy it here from the ASI bookstore. 

With stock markets in decline all round the planet, now's the time to invest, and for that you need The Harriman Book Of Investing Rules: Collected wisdom from the world's top 150 investors by Philip Jenks and Stephen Eckett. At our online bookstore it's £13.99 + postage, nearly a third off the normal price.

The tactics, strategies and insights relied on by 150 of the world's most respected financial experts are revealed in this short, digestible book, which is a no-nonsense list of investment do's and don'ts from the investment elite. Good luck!

Buy it here from the ASI bookstore. 

With my Christmas and New Year only just subsiding, I'm tempted to recommend this new title (published 28 January, but you can order it now on our online bookstore): Beat the Booze by Edmund Tirbutt and Helen Tirbutt (£6.49 + pp – normal price £9.99). But it's really about dealing with the problems of serious drinkers. Well... perhaps I'll recommend it anyway.

More to my taste, though, is Junk Medicine: Doctors, Lies and the Addiction Bureaucracy by iconoclastic doc Theodore Dalrymple (£9.74 + pp – normal price:£14.99). Almost everything you know about heroin addiction is wrong, he says. Heroin is not highly addictive; withdrawal from it is not medically serious; addicts do not become criminals to feed their habit; addicts do not need any medical assistance to stop taking heroin; and heroin addiction is more about mentality than biology.

Browse a wide range of other titles in the Adam Smith Institute's bookshop. 

A virtual pantechnicon has delivered a new 2008 delivery of virtual books to our online bookstore. A title that caught my eye was How to Get Seriously Rich While Failing in Business: A Fat Cat's Guide to Management by Philip Sadler. You can buy it at a knock-down £5.99+pp (the normal price is £9.99 so that's quite a saving).

Looking at the vast pay-offs that go to FTSE-100 managers when they get fired, it certainly seems that you don't need talent to pocket the odd half million. But there's an art to it: you have to be sneaky and negotiate a package of perks and bonuses that will leave you rich without you having to do anything to justify them.

The Sunday Times called this witty commentary on business life 'A book dedicated to the not always popular themes of greed... and good old-fashioned fat-cattery.'

Buy it here, from the ASI bookstore. 

Clues for the Clueless: Dogbert's Big Book of Manners (£5.69 + postage)

"Lots of things have changed in the millions of years since etiquette was invented. Microwave ovens, for example. And so it seemed like a good time to update the rules of etiquette. Of course, you could buy some other book on etiquette, and in it you might find such useful titbits as what kind of uniiform the upstairs servants should wear, or the proper way to address the Pope when you meet him in person. But if you want practical information - like what to do after you sneeze in your hand - then you have to buy this book. It's the only book that speaks to you as the unwashed heathen that you know you are. Thanks. And I'm not just saying that."

Buy it here, from the ASI bookstore. 

I'm pleased to see that Ross Clark's witty exposee of the ridiculous rules and regulations we live by – How to Label a Goat – has gone into a well-deserved second edition printing.

Buy it here, from the ASI bookshop.

On a more worthy front, though, this week I'm recommending William Wilberforce, the new biography of the great anti-slavery campaigner, written by former Conservative leader (and fellow Yorkshireman) William Hague MP. It documents well the parliamentary tribulations he had to go to, which of course the author understands, being in the business himself. Wilberforce's campaign really was the work of a lifetime.

Click here to order it.