The list of countries with the largest trade surplus with the United States is led by China, which exports $375 billion more than it imports. It is followed, distantly, by Mexico ($ 71 bn), Japan (69 bn), Germany (65 bn), Vietnam (38 bn), Ireland (38 bn) and Italy (31 bn). If we do the exercise of putting aside the 2018 report of the USTR (Office of the US Trade Representative 2018 National Trade Estimate), the markets that have the more protectionist measures against the United States are China, the European Union, Japan, Mexico and India. What a surprise.

In an exchange with readers on Time magazine’s website on December 22, 2010, the Fed chief – at the time Ben Bernanke – was asked why the Fed is creating dollars “out of thin air”. His response was that the Fed does not print money.

In addition, since the early 1980 the Fed no longer pays attention to the quantity of money as such but rather sets a target to interest rates. This further reinforces the view that the Fed has nothing to do with the active generation of money “out of thin air”.

[From an interview with Hans-Hermann Hoppe conducted by Juan Fernando Carpio.]

Carpio: Why do economists in general not teach the role of saving for the economy?

In a speech this week to the Organization of American States, Vice President Mike Pence issued the standard, obligatory denunciation of the communist regime in Cuba, which the U.S. national-security establishment (i.e., the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA) have targeted for regime change ever since the Cuban revolution in 1959. Pence stated:

When President Reagan met with Mikhail Gorbachev in Reykjavik, Iceland, on October 11, 1987, it helped put into motion events that would dramatically change the global system. A line of communication was fully opened with an enemy of decades and substantive issues were on the table. Though the summit was initially reported as a failure, with the two sides unable to sign a final agreement, history now shows us that it was actually a great success that paved the way to the eventual end of the Cold War and a reduction in the threat of a nuclear war.

The First World War carries a special significance in the history of Austrian economics. It not only symbolized the triumph of militarism and nationalism over the all-too-brief flourishing of liberalism, but also sowed the seeds of fascism, socialism, and the Second World War that ultimately forced the emigration of the Austrians from their native country.

The well-known thesis of Max Weber regarding the intimate relationship between Calvinism and Capitalism has long been challenged by Western scholars yet has always found its proponents.

On the matter of immigration, Ron Paul suggested he’d like to see the green card system streamlined to make it easier to work legally in the US. Specifically, he has called for green cards that permit legal employment — and can be easily obtained by “illegal aliens” — but don’t grant political rights like access to welfare or the road to citizenship.

The recent collapse of the Argentine Peso and other emerging currencies is more than a warning sign.