entrepreneurship

The COVID-19 pandemic has already inflicted severe damage on the Ukrainian economy despite relatively mild public health implications so far. The number of new COVID-19 cases seems to have stabilized over the last few weeks.

The COVID-19 pandemic has not only limited our liberties, but also liberated creativity. Vilnius mayor and LFMI’s ex-president has allowed turning the whole city into a giant outdoor café and let businesses to exploit parks and squares for this purpose.

There are relatively strict and complex state aid rules applied across the developed world. In the EU database alone, there are no less than 33,000 such cases of reported or investigated state aid cases in the last 20 years.

In times of crisis, it is easy to make mistakes, and no one can be infallible. One of the most characteristic signs of the crisis is its politicization. All parties want to prove that they have the best program and ideas to get out of the crisis.

Today, about 100,000 Lithuanians take advantage of this opportunity to legally supplement their income—but starting a small business hasn’t always been so simple, and the threat of losing this tool that helps entrepreneurs like Ona succeed is very real.

This year, Prague will be celebrating the 30th spring since the fall of communism. It will also welcome a number of well-known friends of liberty as guests of Liberal Institute and Czech Students for Liberty.

Slovakia is a small country. It cannot afford to be uneducated. Still, the country has been sinking in the PISA rankings that measure “smartness” by comparing results of educational systems. Many small countries rank ahead of Slovakia.

Mark Zuckeberg appeared before U.S. representatives, again. He sat alone at an austere table, being looked down on by the mighty politicians from their raised podium. Yet, the founder of Facebook yields more power than all those politicians combined.

In Slovakia, the minimum wage has become a political evergreen of every autumn. However, its growth has been rapidly increasing in recent years. Moreover, the former Slovak prime minister has proposed a new law, which will set the minimum wage at 60% of an average wage of the previous year.

Ukrainian government needs to take steps to reduce the possibility of hostile takeovers of property and should ensure transparent and lawful conduct of the judicial system and law enforcement agencies. It should also engage Ukrainian business associations in policy making.