How can societies advance social justice? Many of the goals of social justice are addressed by research on economic freedom, including social tolerance and protection of minority rights, promotion of democracy and political freedoms, and income inequality. We survey the academic literature on...

This research investigates the relationship between public policy and firm deaths in the U.S. States. Policies that promote firm births may increase or decrease firm deaths. We use components of the Economic Freedom of North America index (EFNA) as a metric to evaluate the relationship between...

The Economic Freedom of North America (EFNA) index, which ranks the states, was first produced in 2002 and has been updated annually since 2010. The 2016 report was its twelfth edition. The EFNA index has been cited in over 200 academic articles, book chapters, and policy papers. We provide an...

Some immigration opponents claim that immigrants import bad institutions and policies from their country of origin into their new home country. We argue just the opposite—namely, that immigrants are more likely to self-select into countries with better institutions than those in their home...

This paper is the first attempt to produce an economic freedom index for local economies in the U.S. It provides a more comprehensive measure of the restrictions government places upon economic freedom compared to simple fiscal measures like total government spending or revenue. That makes it a...