G. The “Problem” of Unemployment
An economic bugbear of our times is “unemployment.” Not only is this considered the pre-eminent problem of the “depression” in the “business cycle”; it is also generally considered the primary “problem” of the “capitalist system,” i.e., of the developed free-market economy. “Well, at least socialism solves the unemployment problem,” is supposed to be the most persuasive argument for socialism.
Much of the push to raise minimum wages centers on the assumption that each individual worker should be paid an amount that allows the worker to purchase food, health care, transportation, and housing based on that one wage alone. In many cases, the living wage claims extend to the claim that each worker — or two adult workers, in some cases — should be able to support a family of four or more.
C. Supply of Land
We have seen throughout that the processes of price determination for the unit services of land and labor are exactly the same. Both sets of factors tend to earn their MVP; both receive advances of present money from capitalist-entrepreneurs; etc. The analysis of the pricing of unit services of original or “permanent” factors applies equally to each. There are three basic differences between the conditions of land and those of labor, however, that make separation of the two important.
FedEx and UPS recently announced they will not ship the “Ghost Gunner,” a specific digital mill (like a 3D printer, but for metals) marketed as capable of fashioning parts without serial numbers.
Austrians oppose the whole notion of trying to accurately measure “inflation” which mainstream economists see as a general rise in prices. (Austrians view inflation as a politically engineered increase in the money supply.)
The prime minister of Iceland recently commissioned a report by Frosti Sigurjonsson to recommend a better money and banking system for Iceland. The recently released report recaps Iceland’s sorry history of money and banking disasters and lays the majority of the blame for the 2008 collapse on the institution of fractional reserve banking, which caused an out-of-control increase in the money supply.
In recent years, Paul Krugman has incessantly defended France and its welfare state, even going so far as to pretend that the French economy was in fact in better shape than the British economy. According to him, “To an important extent, what ails France in 2014 is hypochondria, belief that it has illnesses it doesn’t.” However, except for some Keynesian propagandists, nobody believes that the French economy is not deeply in crisis and it is now more and more obvious that Krugman is wrong.
