Interventionism

"These false prophets of capitalism are the greatest friends that proponents of socialism have."

Lucas's view — namely, that the 1929 downturn would have been a run-of-the-mill depression, but the Fed's timidity turned it into the Great one — was popularized by Milton Friedman.

The costs of the persecution of bingo operators are not limited to the financial burden on taxpayers but also include loss of individual liberty and the unintended consequences, which are difficult to quantify. Citizens, no matter how rich or poor, have the right to make bad decisions.

In order to bring our economy back on track, government needs to get out of the way of entrepreneurs and capitalists. We need to leave holes undug and paper unprinted.

In reality, a house is a consumers' good, just like an automobile or a refrigerator.

All of these things deny the true desires of people — as revealed in market prices — and substitute the opinions of the elite and politically-powerful for the true desires of people.

What is still missing is one critical thing: a culture-wide love of liberty that is capable of intimidating and beating back the rogue regime.

"When the government runs up a deficit to fund 'stimulus' projects, all that really means is that it is forcing taxpayers to pay for projects that they wouldn't buy with their own money."

We find ourselves enormously worse off, our economic prospects diminished greatly, and our liberties throttled more tightly by an even bigger Leviathan, with nothing to show for it on the upside but the further enrichment of a handful of big bankers and other malefactors of great wealth and power.

Sponsored by the Mises Institute and held at the College of Charleston in South Carolina; 7-9 April 1995.