Free Republic

When the world’s richest man left California — taking his multitrillion electric car and space companies with him — the Golden State lost out on billions of dollars in economic benefits. Elon Musk’s SpaceX launched its record-breaking IPO on Friday, making him the world’s first trillionaire while enriching many employees and investors. Musk didn’t travel to the New York Stock Exchange for the ceremonial bell ringing, instead choosing to celebrate at his company’s headquarters in South Texas — surrounded by some of the estimated 4,000 millionaires he created through the public offering. It was a symbolic move for Musk, who’s...

Yesterday afternoon I wrote this:I suspect that tomorrow the real work of demagoguery will begin and we'll start seeing thousands of voices echoing whatever Bernie Sanders has to say about it. Tonight is the calm before the storm.As it turned out, we didn't have to wait until today for the ritual denunciations of Elon Musk to begin. The Globe and Mail in Canada was already on it with this article:The Globe and Mail @globeandmail · Follow Opinion: SpaceX IPO makes Elon Musk the first trillionaire. Here’s how to properly hate himThe article makes the case that it's not Musk's wealth...

In a post back in January, commenting on the November 2025 off-year elections, I remarked that the buzz-word of the moment for the Democrats appeared to be “affordability.” Many credited that theme as being the winning issue that took the Virginia and New Jersey Democratic gubernatorial candidates (Abigail Spanberger and Mikie Sherrill) over the top. And yet the policies that Spanberger and Sherrill had advocated as the centerpieces of their “affordability” agendas were taken from the playbooks of California and New York, otherwise known as the leading states for intentionally driving up costs for their residents. Anybody could see that...

Democrat billionaire Tom Steyer is drawing fire after appearing at a May Day rally in East San Jose alongside a well-known labor leader, where he was labeled a “class traitor,” and embraced for it. Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher, president of the California Federation of Labor, highlighted the moment on X, writing: “When @TomSteyer shows up to your ‘Workers Over Billionaires’ May Day Rally in East San Jose, you ask him to wear the shirt. And he does! #ClassTraitor.” The optics of a billionaire donning anti-billionaire messaging quickly ignited criticism online, with detractors blasting both Steyer and organized labor for what they...

Companies that rely on the gig economy model for workers scored a big win in courts Monday after an appeals court overturned a lower court ruling that previously found Proposition 22 illegal. Proposition 22 passed by a wide margin in November 2020, exempting app-based gig economy drivers from California’s terrible AB5 law and allowing them to continue to work as independent contractors. However, almost a year later, it was ruled unconstitutional by a California court. But a legal challenge to that ruling carried on, and a year and a half later, those app-based companies scored a victory, according to the...

The Internal Revenue Service penalty for tax underpayments has nearly tripled since 2021, putting gig economy workers and consultants at the largest risk of having to cough up big bucks to Uncle Sam. As of Oct. 1, the IRS will now charge 8% interest on estimated tax underpayments, up from 3% two years ago, according to The Wall Street Journal.

There seem to be another one of these stories cropping up every week. The state of California has been waging a war on the gig economy for quite a while now and they may wind up winning, assuming they can drive the companies involved (along with most of their workers) out of the state. Uber, Lyft and Airbnb are the state government’s favorite targets, but there are other, smaller services feeling the pinch as well. Also, writers are being shut out by these recent actions.At Forbes, Paco Freire takes a deep dive into the impact this is having on...

Democrats hate the gig economy, since they can’t force independent contractors to join unions (and thus rake off their union dues). So Biden’s NLRB issued a “joint-employer standard” to force companies to treat gig employees and subcontractors as subject to union representation. Well, a federal judge in Texas squashed that rule. Last week, a federal judge in Texas issued a ruling that struck down a new joint-employer standard by the U.S. National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) that would have classified numerous companies as “employers” of specific contract and franchise employees, obligating them to negotiate with unions representing those workers. U.S....

We’ve known this was coming for some time, but California is now ready to vote on Assembly Bill 5, designed to basically try to put Uber, Lyft and any of their gig economy competitors out of business in the state. The vote could come as soon as today. But the way they wound up wording it may end up giving the ride-sharing companies an immediate out once the inevitable challenges make it through the courts. (Insider) Uber and Lyft’s day of reckoning is here.California senators are set to vote as early as Tuesday on Assembly Bill 5, a proposed...

A new California law intended to force employers to hire workers as employees rather than treat them as contractors is killing freelance jobs across the Golden State and leaving those contractors in limbo. Assembly Bill 5 (A.B. 5), which took effect January 1, was drafted in response to Dynamex Operations West Inc. v. Superior Court of Los Angeles, a landmark court case that established a three-pronged test to determine whether companies are correctly classifying employees and contractors. That test says that contractors must control their workload, not perform work within the business's primary scope of operations, and be "customarily engaged"...

Sam Bankman-Fried: I don’t know where $10 billion went. The Pentagon: We don’t know where $2.2 trillion went. The IRS: You just sent $601.37 don’t forget to report it.” The Biden administration is recruiting 87,000 IRS agents, allegedly to keep an eye on billionaires. .. aiming at the little fish of the gig economy instead. Taking payments for a side hustle via PayPal or Venmo? Not only is the IRS reminding you those payments are taxable income, it’s deputizing those payment companies to snitch on you. ... But wait — it gets worse. People get payments through these companies for...

Within the complex terrain of American politics, Democrats, like Republicans, frequently support social policy initiatives. The political party has expressed its intention to bring about significant changes in American culture, ranging from banning plastic straws to banning specific kinds of guns. Some of these ideas have been well received, but others have encountered opposition from politicians on opposing sides of the issue. Some of these proposals, according to their detractors, might impose restrictions that have far-reaching effects. Here's an in-depth exploration of 10 facets Democrats are often accused of wanting to restrict in America: 1. Gun Control 2. Fossil Fuels...

Harold Daggett — the union boss who has vowed to “cripple” the US economy if ports don’t ban automation and raise dockworkers’ wages sharply — had a Bentley convertible parked outside his sprawling mansion in New Jersey this week, exclusive photos obtained by The Post reveal. Photos taken by drone on Tuesday show the British luxury car parked with its top up outside what appears to be a five-car garage that’s connected to his 7,136-square-foot, Tudor-style home by a covered skyway. ---SNIP--- He described himself as a target of the mob – though a turncoat Mafia member had testified Daggett...

Low incentives and complicated state regulations, combined with high housing and business costs, have rendered California unable to keep Hollywood from moving production to other states and countries, according to an entertainment industry report released on May 27 by the Milken Institute, a California-based think tank.Hollywood’s in-state production has dropped in the past two years as other states and international destinations continue to increase industry incentives, according to the report’s authors, Kevin Klowden, executive director for the Milken Institute Finance, and Madeleine Waddoups, a graduate teaching assistant in the Luskin School of Public Affairs at the University of California–Los Angeles.The...

This is a compilation of the many, many things that American Democrats (often radical totalitarian communists wearing the mantle of “progressive liberals”) want to ban. This is a running tabulated list that originated from an earlier post about busybodies. There, I argued that Social Justice Warriors (SJW) was just another name for a busybody. This is a set aside list tabulated by request. It supersedes the extensive list on an earlier post about busybodies. Remember, boys and girls, all bans are a restriction on freedom. Go ahead and shake your head in disbelief. These people are friggin’ lunatics. The List...

California’s aggressive push for a $20 fast-food minimum wage was sold as a moral victory for workers, a bold stand against corporate greed that would lift families without consequence. Yet the reality unfolding at Carl’s Jr. locations across the state tells a different story—one of shuttered opportunities, fleeing staff, and franchise operators driven to bankruptcy. What began as political virtue-signaling has delivered economic pain that no amount of union rhetoric can disguise. Friendly Franchisees Corporation, a major operator running dozens of Carl’s Jr. restaurants, filed for Chapter 11 protection last month, citing the wage mandate as a primary driver of...

Last week, a shocking moment of truth broke through the huge effort elites normally put into hiding their disdain for the rest of us. At an event sponsored by the libertarian Cato Institute, President of the Peterson Institute for International Economics, Adam Posen—a man who appears to be paid $450,000 a year—made clear his absolute contempt for the working class.

FOR DECADES, THE FORMULA for career success was simple: go to school, get a job, climb the ladder. But the ladder is now collapsing before our eyes. And honestly, good riddance. The career ladder isn’t just an outdated metaphor — it actively blocks people from finding more fulfilling work. Think about it this way: In school, there are clear markers for success. The goal is to get good grades. This continues into entry-level roles, where workers strive for raises and promotions. Tracked careers like law and consulting are attractive, at least in part, because they offer legible paths for advancement....

https://x.com/WallStreetApes/status/2022898940035899849 Wall Street Apes@WallStreetApesIt’s all coming out. Linkedin Billionaire Reid Hoffman’s name appears 2,600 times in the new Jeffrey Epstein FilesElon Musk was rightThe Biden Admin was letting top Democrat donors and Jeffrey Epstein clients sponsor DOJ investigationsElon Musk reveals “The SpaceX lawsuit was funded by Reid Hoffman, who is a major Dem donor and also a Jeffrey Epstein Client”Think about that, Democrats let their donors use our law enforcement to target their enemiesElon Musk explains the SpaceX DOJ investigation went on for YEARS, he explains in details the Weaponization of law enforcementAnd it was sponsored by a top Democrat...

This year rewards theorists of creative destruction. The 2025 Nobel Prize in Economics honors three economists whose work embodies an idea first coined by Joseph Schumpeter: creative destruction. Joel Mokyr, Philippe Aghion, and Peter Howitt have each advanced our understanding of how technological progress drives human prosperity. As Schumpeter described, every technological advance has two faces. It destroys by rendering old methods obsolete, yet it creates by flooding the market with new goods and more efficient ways of meeting human needs.The Nobel Committee’s focus on creative destruction feels particularly relevant today, in an era dominated by fears over artificial intelligence....