Did you notice this line in the president’s recent State of the Union address: “ I ask… America’s business leaders to…raise your employees’s wages.”

This is not the first time a president has made this “request” of employers.

After the stock market crash of 1929, President Hoover began talking about wages. They needed to be protected from cuts, he said, and preferably increased, so that consumer demand would increase. More consumer demand would supposedly get the economy through the storm.

Ludwig von Mises and Joseph Schumpeter are the most famous economists trained by the older Austrian School, although generally Schumpeter has received the lion’s share of attention.[1] This is especially true, for example, in the field of entrepreneurship. To this day, the term entrepreneurship is almost synonymous with Schumpeter, whose fame was built on the success of his Theory of Economic Development (1911) and Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy (1942).

Peter Klein at the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs discussing entrepreneurship, agriculture, commodities, protectionism, rural economies, and more.

For those who might prefer a shorter summary of Bernanke’s legacy see John B. Taylor’s 300 word “Monetary Policy During Ben Bernanke’s Time at the Fed.” Since this was originally prepared in December for the Washington Bureau of the Wall Street Journal, I would guess it is a major source for much of appeared what the Journal’s legacy editorial that is highlighted in today’s Daily.

As Chairman Bernanke’s reign at the Fed comes to an end, the Wall Street Journal provides its assessment of “The Bernanke Legacy.” Overall the Journal does a reasonable job on both Greenspan and Bernanke, especially compared to the “effusive praise from the usual suspects; supporters of monetary central planning.

Paul Singer is the manager of the $23 billion Elliott Management hedge fund. In a recent letter to investors in the fund, he expressed bearish sentiments on bitcoin, while remaining bullish on gold despite its recent fall in price. Wrote Singer:

Over at the Global Economic Intersection my lecture on the economics of the war on drugs is the documentary of the week. This is fitting given the horrible news of Philip Seymour Hoffman dying this week of an apparent drug overdose.