Beyond Brexit: A Programme for UK Reform
The Policy Reform Group
London: Sage Publications, 2019
93 pp.

The Marginal Revolutionaries: How Austrian Economists Fought the War of Ideas
Janek Wasserman
New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2019
xiii + 354 pp.

One of the most powerful men in the world, Chairman of the Federal Reserve Jerome Powell, appeared on 60 Minutes over the weekend. The interview did not mention Austrian economics, a return to the gold standard, or a new laissez-faire stance by the Fed. But there are some thought-provoking sound bites.

Listen to the Audio Mises Wire version of this article.

I have long been fascinated by both public policy and the interesting crooks, crannies, and oddities found in the English language. Recently, I came across one such tidbit which connected both of those interests.

“There are no libertarians in an epidemic” crowed Atlantic reporter Peter Nicholas back on March 10, as he listed the numerous economic interventions the Trump administration was undertaking in the wake of the mounting COVID-19 crisis.

No sooner had the COVID-19 recession hit the US economy—with its mandatory business and school closures, travel bans, shelter-in-place orders, and a massive drop in commercial activity—than politicians, academics, journalists, and business leaders began calling for the Fed to save it.

The Economists’ Hour: False Prophets, Free Markets, and the Fracture of Society
Binyamin Appelbaum
New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2019
439 pp.

David Gordon (dgordon@mises.org) is a senior fellow at the Mises Institute.