Jeff Deist and Dr. Jonathan Newman break down Chapters 2–4 of Man, Economy, and State. This is vintage Rothbard: precise definitions; hardcore explanations of property, prices, and exchange; the problems of "hegemonic" state violence; and a "beautiful" (per Dr. Newman) conception of social cooperation.
Jeff Deist tackles the first Chapter of Man, Economy, and State. So much of what economics texts get wrong is laid out brilliantly here by Rothbard, who gives readers the basics of action, means/ends, time, ranking, factors of production, and capital in this 77 page master class.
Providing the opening for Mises’s great methodological work gave Rothbard the opportunity to set down his perspective on the importance of the praxeological method.
Providing the opening for Mises’s great methodological work gave Rothbard the opportunity to set down his perspective on the importance of the praxeological method.
If time preference is genetically built into humans, are they double discounting future goods? Does this mean people should stop trying to weigh time in their calculations?
It isn’t a good argument against Austrian economics that someone might come up with a science that made better predictions. You have to show us the science, so that it can be compared with praxeology. Suffice it to say that this hasn’t been done.
Human beings do not exist to be pawns in a game of lockdowns and collective action.
Quantitative methods can't be applied to human action, which is purposeful and not a mere reflex. For this reason, mathematical formulas can only describe events, never explain them.
Choosing between labor and leisure is not like choosing between apples and oranges. Many people like both kinds of fruit. But labor involves disutility, so a better choice is this: between apples and rotten oranges.
If you've wanted to read Human Action, this is your opportunity to hear it explained by great economists and scholars!
