As socialists gain power in American cities and states, they look to destroy the creation of wealth and to tax the wealth-creators into oblivion. We know how these scenarios end.
Audio Mises Wire
Audio recordings of Mises Wire articles, offering contemporary news and opinion through the lens of Austrian economics and libertarian political economy.
The latest rage among defense contractors is the rise of the high-tech “neo-primes,” firms which supposedly will apply “smart” militarization. History and reality tell us, however, that these companies soon enough will be as bloated and corrupt as their contemporaries.
Did the Declaration of Independence carry a hidden message of abolition of slavery? Justice Clarence Thomas and historian Harry Jaffa believe that, but legal scholar Wanjiru Njoya holds that such an interpretation pushes the envelope too far.
The Appalachian region, while always relatively poor, had strong families and institutions that held things together. In the aftermath of the expansion of the welfare state and the shrinking of the iron, steel, and coal industries, we have seen social breakdowns and increasing drug addiction.
The recent primary defeat of Thomas Massie will deprive this country of a free-market and anti-war voice. How should libertarians respond?
Viewing the Declaration of Independence as the act that created one consolidated American nation is a common historical anachronism, which projects a later nationalist understanding backward onto the founding era.
In contemplating the life and career of Ludwig von Mises, one is struck by the nobility and grandeur, the high courage, of his lonely and lifelong struggle on behalf of truth and laissez-faire. But what led Mises to pursue his lonely and seemingly doomed struggle until the very end?
The Federal Reserve continues to destroy the economy’s savings base through a combination of artificially low interest rates and inflation. This war on savings will not end anytime soon.
What inspires us about the life of Mises, writes Lew Rockwell, is not his victimhood but his triumph over evil.
In attacking progressivism in a recent speech, Clarence Thomas has been pilloried in the media and by politicians and academics. However, Thomas was correct: progressivism has brought one disaster after another, all the while empowering the worst of state actors.
For too long, people have thought of the airwaves and waterways as “public” property that is best controlled by government. However, Murray Rothbard and others held that one could apply the institution of private property to both.
As I see it now, there are really two economies—two distinct systems of producing and exchanging wealth. Or rather, two systems that purport to do these things.
Public goods theory often assumes what it seeks to establish, namely, that the state is the indispensable precondition of production, even though the state itself depends upon prior production for every resource it possesses.
The White House leaks that a deal is almost done. Markets surge. Insiders profit. The deal collapses. Repeat. Now the markets barely move. Nobody believes it anymore. A government that cries wolf this many times eventually finds itself alone.
The popular pastime of modern democracies of punishing the diligent and thrifty, while rewarding the lazy, improvident, and unthrifty, is cultivated via the State, fulfilling a demo-egalitarian program based on a demo-totalitarian ideology.
Mamdani’s election is not the cause of economic decline. Instead, New York City’s slide into chaos has been ongoing for many years, and Mamdani promises to make things even worse.
Remembering Murray Rothbard on our imperialistic wars: "The true principle of isolationism is that the government should be isolated and people who trade, interchange, and engage in voluntary travel, migration, and so forth should be allowed to peacefully do so."
Historically, many sovereign states have granted separatist cultural and ideological groups political autonomy as a means of avoiding full secession. The US legal system prevents this.
Zohran Mamdani’s proposal reflects a growing belief that economic problems can be solved through public ownership and political management. But a grocery store is still a business governed by costs, and economic reality regardless of who owns it.
Social contract theory was used to critique a form of the state, but was also used to legitimize the modern nation-state.
