Philosophy and Methodology

Economic theory must have only one purpose — to explain economic activity. However, statistical methods are of no help in this regard.

Dr. Joe Salerno and Jeff Deist explore the method of economics.

Unlike Hamilton, Jefferson did not believe that state coercion should be used to re-shape and control society and markets.

Conservatives have often claimed that that the libertarian (aka "classical liberal") alleges "human freedom as the single moral imperative. " But I doubt a single example of this could be found in the whole history of liberalism.

State-centered ideas around crime focus on imprisonment and punishment. But a restitution-centered model would be much better for victims.

The fallacy that labor-saving machines create technological unemployment has not only been disproved by theory but also by the whole history of mankind.

The thinking goes that MIT's new GDP-B measure allows the statistician to estimate a “consumer surplus.”

Valuation of businesses must be based on appraisement, investment appraisal, and—terra incognita in Austrian economics—negotiation. Discounted cash flow and "relative valuation" methods are well-suited for negotiation purposes.

Hard-left "democratic socialists" think they figured out how to make government planning possible: use prices. But there's a problem in their argument: prices are impossible without markets.

The liberal revolutions that paved the way for the industrial revolution were hallmarks of great progress against the state. As Lord Acton noted, a continuation of this revolutionary spirit is our best hope against the state.