Human action is usually driven by the desire to obtain more for less, and, ideally something
for nothing. This has sometimes been called the economic principle. The wish to “get free
stuff” pervades all times and places, all sectors of the economy, all ages, and all social
backgrounds. The very selfishness for which the market economy is often chided is, at
bottom, a universal quest to obtain goods for free. Jörg Guido Hülsmann sets out to explore
the boundaries of this endeavor. He investigates the nature, forms, causes, and consequences
of gratuitous goods and concludes that they thrive within a free economy. But generosity and
gratuitous abundance tend to be undermined and reversed by central banking and the welfare
state.
Jörg Guido Hülsmann is senior fellow of the Mises Institute where he holds the 2018 Peterson-Luddy Chair and was director of research for Mises Fellows in residence 1999-2004. He is author of Mises: The Last Knight of Liberalism and The Ethics of Money Production. He teaches in France, at Université d'Angers. His full CV is here.
Senior Fellow Jörg Guido Hülsmann joins Ryan and Tho to talk about his new book on the economics of generosity, charity, and abundance.
ISBN: 978-1-61016-766-6
Author retains all non-English rights to this title.
