The Economics Policy Institute (EPI) has promoted a myth that recent price inflation is a “global phenomenon,” is not caused by domestic economic policies. An EPI study claims “that high [price] inflation in the U.S. has not been driven by any unique American policy—not the American Rescue Plan and other generous fiscal relief during the pandemic recession and recovery nor anything else U.S.-centric”.
In a free society, people have the right to decide what to do with their own bodies. If you want to take something that “orthodox” medicine says you shouldn’t, this decision should be up to you. If the government can ban “dangerous drugs,” why not dangerous ideas too? As the great Ludwig von Mises points out, “Opium and morphine are certainly dangerous, habit-forming drugs. But once the principle is admitted that it is the duty of government to protect the individual against his own foolishness, no serious objections can be advanced against further encroachments.
According to mainstream economics, interest rates are the price of money, but the Austrian school says differently. To understand these conflicting ideas, we must understand what prices, money, and interest are.
From day one of his presidency, it has been apparent that Argentina’s President Javier Milei wants the Argentinian regime to be a willing member of the US-NATO axis in international affairs.
There is an attack on the customer by its anti-market enemies. These enemies dislike market economies and private property and wish to see these institutions destroyed. The enemies want to see a new “king” to the throne—one that dislikes the customer. These enemies want to install a “king” that does not care about what you want to consume, but what they want you to consume.
Global money supply has soared by $20.6 trillion since 2019, according to Bloomberg.
Additionally, global debt surged by over $15 trillion in 2023, reaching a new record high of $313 trillion. Around 55% of this rise came from developed economies, mainly the U.S., France, and Germany. Unfunded liabilities in the United States amount to $72 trillion, almost 300% of GDP. This may seem high until you look at Spain with 500% of GDP, France with close to 400%, or Germany with close to 350% of GDP.
The Federal Reserve seems to have finally committed to, but has not yet begun its “rate cutting cycle” of lower interest rates, specifically the Federal Funds Rate, or policy rate.
This lines up well with what I have been thinking and saying here and elsewhere; the Fed was not likely to cut rates until the fall of 2024 or later.
Ludwig von Mises depicts the aim of revolutionary socialism as: “to clear the ground for building up a new civilization by liquidating the old one.” One of the main strategies in liquidating a civilization involves dismantling its legal and philosophical foundations.
Land in its natural state is not owned by anyone, argued John Locke in Two Treatises of Government, but after land is transformed by an individual’s labor, that person earns a right to own the land and any improvements. In the mid-1800s, the U.S. government put Locke’s property-rights theory into practice with the Homestead Act. Russia replicated the act in recent years. Today, America needs a modern version to create new opportunities.
