This Libertas Award acceptance speech was delivered at the XXIII Forum da Liberdade, in Porto Alegre, Brazil, on April 12, 2010.
Mises was one of the greatest intellectuals of the twentieth century, a resolute and uncompromising champion of freedom. Fifty years ago, Mises came to South America and delivered those six historic lectures, which are heralded and quoted just outside, at the Forum’s exhibit.
A common argument advanced in support of greater government intervention in the American healthcare market is that a large and growing fraction of the gross domestic product (GDP) is spent on healthcare, while the results, such as average life expectancy, do not compare favorably to the Western nations that have adopted some form of universal healthcare.
This argument is spurious for two reasons:
Many people are rightly concerned about economic conditions, which are far more grim than the official statistics suggest. Young people out of college are facing a stagnant job market. Businesses have rethought expansion plans. Retrenchment continues to be the watchword in nearly every area of commercial life.
It is a common assumption in today’s world that capitalism is, at best, out of control and, at worst, outright evil. Everyone knows that it causes most of our financial, economic, and social problems, and that we need a referee—the government— to make sure that all is fair and that we innocent citizens are not taken advantage of by predatory companies and capitalists.
The fact, of course, is that everyone is wrong.
According to the teachings of the Greek philosopher Parmenides, language illustrates human thinking (and reasoning); confused language is thus tantamount to confused thinking; confused thinking, in turn, provokes unintended acts and undesired outcomes.
Murray N. Rothbard (1926–1995) was dean of the Austrian School. He was an economist, economic historian, and libertarian political philosopher. This essay is the introduction to a new edition of Mises’s The Clash of Group Interests, published by the Mises Institute, 2011.
Everyone knows that the unemployment situation is very bad, but the official figures (not surprisingly) understate the problem. In this article I’ll outline the severity of the stalled labor market, and explain some of the major causes. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the official civilian unemployment rate in February was 8.9 percent. However, this figure (called U-3) is very misleading in the present environment, because so many potential workers have become discouraged and are no longer seeking work.
