This is such an important book. Same stupid problems 30 years ago and we did nothing about it.

I find is kind of scary how relevant this 30 year old book is. It feels like Sowell is talking about today. IRO discusses a diverse set of economic topics and the interrelationship between them in a fascinating way. His thinking is clear, anologistic and compelling.

Sound wisdom

Anyone and everyone learns from reading Mr. Sowell. It's that simple. Just read him if you haven't already, and read more if you have. Even if you disagree with him, you will benefit.

I listened to this book on audiobook, and the single worst part of this format (and perhaps the book's format) is the lack of date for each essay. This makes understanding the context in which the essay is being written difficult to infer--especially for someone who was not alive when these essays were written.

Still, the wit and ability of Sowell to compress complex ideas into digestible bite-sized pieces is impressive, even if Sowell occasionally comes off as a stereotypical crabby old person with some of the essays. However, compared to Sowell's other books, this collection of essays lacked a unifying message and empirical edge that made Sowell's other books so powerful.

Dude's smart.

Another excellent set of essays. More stories of government's dangerous edicts, coming from the "anointed" and "deep thinkers", and their unintended consequences. I was a bit surprised (but agreeable) that he wants to call off the war on drugs, although I might disagree with him saying that bad acts against offenders in prison should not be thrown at the feet of the state and counted as punishment, even if not handed down from the court. He covers the mess of affirmative action - racism, the "homeless" - many being bums abusing the system, defense of property rights and the benefits they provide to anyone because of owners' rational self-interest, and economics versus politics - the reality of scarcity and the continual waste of other people's stolen money for pet projects doomed to failure.

"Ideologies are fairytales for adults." - Thomas Sowell

Thomas Sowell offers a lot of no nonsense criticism on a myriad of social issues. The way he illustrates his views is the very definition of the word concise.

This book contains a number of Thomas Sowell’s bite-sized essays.
The content of these essays is still relevant today.

If you want to see examples of essays on a wide range of subjects, this book is useful.
If you like Thomas Sowell, this is a must read.

This collection of essays feels like a Time Capsule of 80’s TV conservatism. Read the “Random Thoughts” chapter at the end— you’ll get the gist of the best of it. Sowell is quite bad at writing on subjects that haven’t affected him personally. He complains but doesn’t give any reasons to substantiate scepticism or dislike of subjects such as climate change, sex Ed, or gay marriage.

One interesting idea— Sowell’s core belief that the premise of economics is scarcity: “there is no free lunch, no “solutions” but only trade-offs.” He cannot conceive of a reality without trade-offs hence all political attempts to alleviate societal financial hardships are attacked as futile grandiose delusions. Sowell claims that politics and economics are fundamentally antagonistic to each other. Sadly, Sowell makes no real attempt to substantiate his economics claims. Individual meritocratic self-discipline is presented as the singular saving balm to all societal ills and personal aspirations. All social engineering and group ideology is bad.

“Just as super-patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel, super-identity is the last refuge of the hustler. Some make a career out of it and others try to escape blame for their own incompetence.”

Thomas Sowell is undeniably bright but he tends to be (at least in this book) heavy on criticism and light on solutions aside from democracy and capitalism - which are not solutions but that is another matter.

As an aside, it is interesting to read these old columns and to realize how much more dire the situations he describes are today. It is enlightening (and disheartening) to see how the culture wars that were being fought so many years ago are still raging on in 2018.

Must read.