Christopher Coyne, author of After War: The Political Economy of Exporting Democracy, discusses the economics of American empire, the true motivations behind the slogan of ‘spreading democracy,’ the domestic problems of intervention including bloated budgets, bureaucracies and lost liberty, how politicians, bureaucrats, and government contractors’ incentives are the opposite of private business – success is punished and failure is rewarded, leading to increased budgets, more employees and more power, the thoroughly bipartisan crony capitalism in Washington DC, the reasons why Germany and Japan were ‘successful’ interventions and the urgent need for renewed skepticism towards the government among the American population.
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