Free Market Economics: A Syllabus

The idea that led to this syllabus was sparked many years ago by Rosalie Slater and Verna Hall. On a visit to The Foundation for Economic Education (referred to in this syllabus as FEE) in Irvington, they asked if FEE had a high school economics text to help teachers present free market ideas in the classroom. I agreed to assemble something suitable if a teacher should inquire. When a specific inquiry came to FEE, I discovered that to do a satisfactory job would be a major undertaking. The enthusiasm of Mrs. Peggy Bryan Crump, herself a high school economics teacher, spurred me on to make the effort.

Thanks are due first of all to FEE and FEE’s President, Leonard E. Read, who pressured me from time to time to “get the syllabus in the past tense,” as he would put it. My debt to Professor Ludwig von Mises, his many books and his seminars which I attended for many years is immeasurable. My husband, Percy L. Greaves, Jr., the economist and an even longer-time student of Mises than

I, deserves credit for having contributed substantially to my economic education through his ever-ready, patient and careful explanations over the years we have been together. Beth Herbener of the

Foundation’s staff was extremely helpful in readying the final manuscript for the printer. But tremendous credit should go to my secretary, Mrs. Virginia Clifford, who proved a veritable “miracle worker” by deciphering successfully my many-times revised and reworked rough drafts and transforming them into clean, neat copy. Special thanks also for Mrs. Valerie Powell’s help with the typing and proof-reading.

This syllabus will have been more than four years in the making—from the time the first word was put on paper until copies come from the printers. I make no pretense at being an original thinker, for the economic theories presented here have had a noble ancestry. My understanding has been derived from others—through their books, lectures and discussions. However, it is my hope that in this syllabus I have interpreted and “translated” into simpler terms the profound economic theories set forth by Mises and his fellow “Austrian” economists so that they may reach a new audience of teachers and, through them, young people on whom depend the prospects for freedom in the future.

BBG