Truth and Consequences: An Open Plea for Peace
I have affiliations with a lot of different organizations that are sometimes at odds with one another: the Mises Institute, the Institute for Humane Studies, the Koch Foundation, the Independent Institute, the Foundation for Economic Education, and others. On more than one occasion, I have used money from Koch Foundation grants to buy Mises Institute books for students. I have nothing but gratitude for the donors who have given so generously to advance the missions of these organizations.
Gaiman on Copyright Piracy and the Web
Fascinating short comments by science fiction author Neil Gaiman on how he came to realize that there was nothing wrong with people copying his books:
Letter from an Austrian in Austria
As an enthusiastic reader of Mises.org, I sometimes feel schizophrenic. Not because I think the economic theory of the Austrian School is in any way unsound. I am an Austrian. But that’s just it. I am an Austrian who lives in Austria. I know Austrian economics in practice as well as in theory.
Allow me to share with my fellow “Austrians” a brief glimpse of the real Austria.
The Rationale for Total Privatization
To progress toward a truly free society, expropriated owners or their legal heirs should be restored as private owners to all public property.
Fashion and Copyright
Whenever I give talks on IP, I use the now-common example of fashion as an industry that is super-profitable, super-competitive, super-innovative very fast moving and yet is not governed by the IP, which is to say that it lives and thrives in a free market. But I’ve variously pointed out too that if IP were suddenly available, we could fully expect that the largest players (or what are now called “industry stakeholders”) in the market would probably grab on to it in celebration. The big players are always happy for a monopoly granted by the state.
Rails, the Environment, and Economic Calculation
I just had an interesting online discussion with John Payne from the Show-Me Institute about light rail. Light rail fails on pretty much every efficiency measure, and I write that as someone who likes being able to get to the places I need to go in St. Louis without having to drive. It just so happened that the MetroLink in St. Louis was consistent with my preferences.
What’s Behind the Currency War?
In September 2010, a short time before the international financial summit of the Group of Twenty (G20) took place in South Korea, Brazilian finance minister Guido Mantega declared that the world is experiencing a “currency war” where “devaluing currencies artificially is a global strategy.”
A Renegade History of the United States
Thaddeus Russell’s A Renegade History of the United States is an important new book: a demonstration that rebels and renegades are society’s benefactors. In this revisionist view of American history, you see, there is “an enduring civil war” between these two factions — the “renegades” and the “moral guardians,” whom he also calls the “disciplinarians.”
Do Labor Unions Make Middle Class Economies?
Friend and fellow Memphian Kevin Perk sent me a picture of the sign outside the local hall of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. The sign reads:
Middle Class economies don’t just happen. They are union made.
Briefly, no: as I wrote last week, this is one of the enduring myths of American economic history.
