Ralph Nader Cites Mises, Hayek, and Rothbard

Ralph Nader argues in his new book, Unstoppable, that the left and right are coming together in their opposition of corporatism: those government policies that favor the economically powerful over the general public interest.  This convergence of the left and right presents an opportunity for people to drop their political labels and unite to overturn the nation’s corporatist economic policies. He wants to eliminate corporate welfare and bailouts, but is short on details about how this can be done.  I’m not objecting here.  The first step is recognizing a commonality of interests that could organize to limit government in this area.  But because I don’t see a clear mechanism here that will be sufficient to overturn entrenched and powerful special interests, it is not apparent that this commonality of interests really is unstoppable. One interesting thing about Nader’s book is his favorable references to prominent Austrian school economists, including Mises, Hayek, and Rothbard.  References like this from a beacon of the political left are a good sign for the visibility and credibility of the Austrian school.