[This originally appeared in Libertarian Review in November 1978.]
Libertarians surely favor freedom of speech, that is, the right to speak without being hampered by the government. But the right to speak implies the right not to speak, the right to remain silent. Yet libertarians have themselves been strangely silent on the many instances of compulsory speech in our society.
March 3 marked the bicentennial of Belgian-born philosopher/economist Gustave de Molinari’s birth. Based on self-ownership and the private property derived from it, he forcefully defended every form of liberty. No wonder Frederic Bastiat named Molinari his successor.
Remembering Molinari’s across-the-board defense of liberty is particularly necessary at a time Americans pay lip service to it, but constantly say “there ought to be a law” that restricts it.
It’s widely agreed that we need more entrepreneurship for economic growth and a higher standard of living. But more is not always better.
In fact, there can be too much of a good thing, in entrepreneurship as in so many other things. The reason is that economic growth comes from successful entrepreneurship that is also productive. And not all entrepreneurs who earn profits contribute to economic growth if they have unproductive -- or, worse, destructive -- effects on the economy.
Quantitative easing, the program of asset buying initiated by the US Federal Reserve Bank in 2008, represents the most profound monetary experiment in the history of the world. Between fall of 2008 and fall of 2014, three successive rounds of QE quadrupled the monetary base of the world’s most-used and dominant currency, from less than $1 trillion to more than $4 trillion. The Fed literally created new money, bought Treasury debt and mortgage-backed debt (of dubious character) from commercial banks, and credited them with new reserves.
The average square footage in new single-family houses has been declining since 2015. House sizes tend to fall just during recessionary periods. It happened from 2008 to 2009, from 2001 to 2002, and from 1990 to 1991.
But even with strong job growth numbers in recent years, it looks like demand for houses of historically large size may have finally peaked.
According to Census Bureau data, the average size of new houses in 2017 was 2,631 square feet. That’s down from the 2015 peak of 2,687.
The Federal Reserve Board of Governors today released a new report today noting changes in net worth for households and nonprofit organizations.
As a result, the Drudge Report featured, at the page top, the headline “ Households see biggest decline in net worth since the financial crisis... “
According to the Federal Reserve’s Underlying Inflation Gauge, the 12-month inflation growth in January 2019 was at 2.9 percent.
In addition to being a libertarian in political philosophy, I am also a member of the Austrian school of economics.
