David Henderson has an important post, “The Wonder of Economic Freedom”. I truly appreciate his emphasis not just on markets, but on economic freedom; what I called elsewhere a free economy – which is much broader than just what is normally viewed as ‘market activity’.
Mises Daily Friday by Joseph Salerno:
Reducing government spending results in an immediate increase in welfare for all productive members of the economy. But, the way we calculate economic growth is rigged to make it look like more government spending fuels economic growth.
Rothbard called Richard Cantillon the “founding father of modern economics.” Chantal Saucier and Mark Thornton’s English translation of Cantillon’s 1755 masterpiece Essai sur la Nature du Commerce en Général is now available for audio download on iTunesU and in the Mises Library.
This audio book is available thanks to the generosity of Mr. Tyler Folger.
As you spend the day with family and friends, we thought you might take some time away from bowl games to enjoy a vintage Rothbard speech that touches on twin themes appropriate to January 1st: reflecting on the past while looking to the future.
Economics has its big problems, notably Keynesian economics, Marxism, positivism, etc. But we are not alone. Even in the hard sciences, there is an alarming amount of ideological interference with the scientific process. Our friend Robert Bradley recently took a look back 25 years ago when the New York Times still had some scientific backbone.
Today’s your last chance in 2014 to donate to the Mises Institute and deny the feds some of your hard-earned dollars!
Donate $60 or more during the month of December and receive a FREE minibook, Murray Rothbard’s Economic Depressions: Their Cause & Cure.
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In the wake of the Obama administration’s partial normalization of relations with Cuba, proponents of the embargo condemned the move, with National Review publishing an unsigned editorial claiming that allowing Americans to trade freely with the island nation amounts to giving comfort to murderous dictators. NR’s editors concluded with:
As libertarians, we’ve seen it all countless times. A friend or colleague who has been going on and on about how incompetent the government is, will say the exact opposite the second the topic turns to foreign policy.
The basic unit of all economic activity is the uncoerced, free exchange of one economic good for another. Moreover, the decision to engage in exchange is based upon the ordinally ranked subjective preferences of each party to the exchange. To achieve maximum satisfaction from the exchange, each party must have full ownership and control of the good that he wishes to exchange and may dispose of his property without interference from a third party, such as government.
