Will DOGE and Musk Make a Difference? (with Michael Munger)

Welcome to Econ Talk, Conversations for the Curious, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty. I'm your host, Russ Roberts of Shalem College in Jerusalem and Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Go to econtalk.org where you can subscribe, comment on this episode, and find links and other information related to today's conversation. You'll also find our archives with every episode we've done going back to 2006. Our email address is mail at econtalk.org.

We'd love to hear from you. Today is December 18th, 2024, and my guest is economist Mike Munger of Duke University. This is Mike's 49th appearance on the program. He was last year in September talking about Bruno Leone. Our topic for today is the Constitution, the so-called Department of Government efficiency, with the expectation it will be led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, and I'm sure we're going to get into many other things along the way.

I want to remind listeners to go to econtalk.org and vote for your favorite episodes of 2024. Mike, I want to start with an observation about the current moment in America and see if you agree. You and I, historically at least, are what might be called classical liberals. At times we have called ourselves libertarians. I've moved in various ways, I think, to what is closer to a conservative, and I'll confess that while much of my life has been tilting at the windmills of government intervention in the economy, I find myself less passionate about those issues.

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