Deliberately Misplaced Blame

Let’s play a game. I have a not-so-famous quotation to share with you, and then you guess who said it: “We might have done nothing. That would have been utter ruin. Instead we met the situation with proposals to private business and to Congress of the most gigantic program of economic defense and counterattack ever evolved in the history of the Republic.”

The Divide Between Society and State

If “we are the government,” then it follows that the man who finds himself in jail must blame himself for putting himself there, and the man who takes all the tax deductions the law allows is really cheating himself. While this may seem to be a farfetched reductio ad absurdum, the fact is that many an armed-services conscript consoles himself with that kind of logic.

The Losing Battle to Fix Gold at $35, Part II

This article takes up where the first part left off: the dismantling of the London Gold Pool in March 1968. The US authority’s fight to keep gold pegged at $35 had by no means ended with the Pool’s demise. Instead it shifted to a new front. That same month a massive gold embargo against South Africa, the world’s largest gold producer, was initiated by the US, a battle that would last till early 1970.

The DC Reality Tour

We read about Washington DC in civics class, but nothing can compare with an actual visit to the Imperial City. Casual visitors to DC are often astounded by the opulence of wealthy quarters, the grandeur of the state’s old monuments to itself and the brutalism of many newer ones, the poverty and crime of the bulk of the city. Now, for the first time, we’ll go behind the scenes and reveal to the general public some of the details of this magnificent and exclusive tour.

Liberty’s Benefactor

Burton Samuel Blumert, one of liberty’s great benefactors, died at age 80 on the morning of March 30, 2009, after a long battle with cancer. He would deny it, but his name deserves to go down in history as a person who served as a champion of freedom during his long life. He was founder and manager of Camino Coins and president of the Center for Libertarian Studies; He served faithfully as chairman of the Mises Institute, succeeding Margit von Mises in that post. He was a dear friend of Murray Rothbard’s. Indeed, in the darkest days, he made the difference.

The Fundamental Obstacles to Economic Recovery: Marxism and Keynesianism

While the influence of Marxism stands directly in the path of a fall in wage rates and prices, by blocking its way with laws and threats, Keynesianism aims to prevent any attempt to overcome these obstacles by allegedly demonstrating the futility and harm of doing so. Both doctrines are fundamental obstacles in the way of economic recovery and must be deprived of influence over public opinion in order for economic recovery to take place. The prerequisite of this necessary change in public opinion is the existence of a powerful, demonstration of the utter fallaciousness of these doctrines that at the same time proves that a free market is the foundation both of full employment and of progressively rising real wages. Happily, this demonstration already exists, in full detail.

Would Cleansing Banks’ Balance Sheets Kick-start the US Economy?

If what keeps the economy depressed is too many toxic assets on banks’ balance sheets, then it makes sense to do whatever is necessary to remove those assets from banks’ balance sheets. Equally, it also makes sense to nationalize banks and force them to lend. We suggest, however, that what matters when it comes to economic recovery is the state of real savings. Contrary to popular thinking, it is real savings that fund economic activity and not bank lending.

Richman’s Law

We all know (or should know) Rockwell’s Law: “Always believe the opposite of what state officials tell you, and the corollary, always do the opposite of what they advise you.” But here is another profound truth. This one is Richman’s Law, from Sheldon Richman, the editor of The Freeman.

An Encouraging Trend among Young Misesian-Rothbardians NOT to Apply to Austrian Graduate Programs

In the past year I have noticed a gratifying trend among undergraduates interested in Austrian economics that bodes well for the future of Austrian economics as a challenger to the prevailing positivist orthodoxy for the title of “mainstream economics.” Here are a few examples of this trend in the past month.

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