David Beito has brought to light a remarkable and previously unknown chapter of the Great Depression: its tax revolts. They were widespread and systematic, and they made such huge progress that in some places they threatened to bring local and state government to its knees. Here we have an aggressive resistance to the New Deal, in the form of some
On March 1, 1933, Friedrich A. von Hayek delivered an inaugural lecture at the London School of Economics. The lecture was published two months later in Economica under the title “The Trend of Economic Thinking.” In the paper, Hayek despairs over the direction of current “public opinion,” which favored increasing state intervention in the economy.
The Free Market 7, no. 1 (January 1989) One of the ironic but unfortunately enduring legacies of eight years of Reaganism has been the resurrection of Keynesianism. From the late 1930s until the early 1970s, Keynesianism rode high in the economics profession and in the corridors of power in Washington, promising that, so long as Keynesian
The Free Market 7, no. 2 (February 1989) A roar, a shudder, and the end of the world. That was Soviet Armenia on December 7th when the great earthquake struck. Whole cities disappeared, as nurseries and factories, offices and homes, collapsed into rubble. In a few moments, more than 55,000 men, women, and children were crushed to death. But no
The Free Market 7, no. 3 (March 1989) A Free Market Breakthrough by Jeffrey M. Herbener The day before my Free Market Reader arrived in the mail, I was discussing economics with a group of businessmen. In response to a request for a book giving an introduction to free-market economics, I recommended Henry Hazlitt’s Economics in One Lesson . But
The Free Market 7, no. 4 (April 1989) Q. When is a tax not a tax? A. When it’s a “fee.” It was only a question of time before we would discover what form of creative semantics President Bush would use to wiggle out of his “read my lips” pledge (bolstered by the Darman “walks like a duck” corollary) never ever to raise taxes. Unfortunately, it
The Free Market 7, no. 5 (May 1989) Any business owner whose employees deliberately set out to harass and even endanger customers could do only one thing: fire the offenders, and maybe sue them for damages as well. Nothing else would be compatible with free-enterprise and private property. But thanks to a whole host of government interventions,
The Free Market 7, no. 6 (June 1989) The broadly held corporation was one of the most important developments of the 19th century. The capital of thousands and then millions of stockholders made possible the profitable development of large firms, which enriched not only their owners, but society as a whole. The railroads were the first to
The Free Market 7, no. 6 (June 1989) Quick: what do the following world-famous men have in common: John Kenneth Galbraith, Donald J. Trump, and David Rockefeller? What values could possibly be shared by the socialist economist who got rich by writing best-selling volumes denouncing affluence; the billionaire wheeler-dealer; and the fabulous head
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.