At my neighborhood supermarket the other day, I was at first puzzled, then a bit amused at the sight on the shelf of “Fair Trade Coffee.” No, this isn’t a catchy brand name like “Morning Call.” This is, I found on inspecting the unusually wordy label in detail, coffee whose supplier claims to have overpaid the producers for it. By this is not
As Martha Stewart languishes in jail, one supposes her duties in the prison laundry or garden allow her little time for reading the Wall Street Journal if, indeed, she’s allowed to receive it in her mail. But if she had time to work her way back to Section D of the edition of October 26, she might have happened upon a small article on the second
Today’s “knuckleheads” are nothing compared to yesterday’s heroes. That was the message from Bill Cosby at a recent gala event in Washington, D.C., to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education . “These people marched and were hit in the face with rocks to get an education,” said Cosby, referring to those who fought a half
Critics of free enterprise have set their sights on business schools, blaming them for recent corporate scandals. If only people like home goods retailer Martha Stewart and Enron’s Jeffrey Skilling were taught business ethics during graduate school, they might not have committed their alleged crimes, or so the argument goes. The implication is
Our mentor has always been Hippocrates, not Adam Smith —President of a County Medical Society at an AMA meeting quoted in the February 16, 1981 issue of the New York Times . This weekend (June 11-13, 2004), the American Medical Association (AMA) will celebrate the 100th anniversary of its Council on Medical Education. The medical establishment
The economist Ludwig von Mises was once asked what one institution gives evidence that a society has crossed into socialism from capitalism or vice versa. He answered clearly and without hesitation: the presence of a stock market. Stock markets indicate a toleration for private ownership and exchange and provide the essential means to compare the
Interventionism cannot be considered as an economic system destined to stay. It is a method for the transformation of capitalism into socialism by a series of successive steps— Ludwig von Mises, “ Middle of the Road Policy Leads to Socialism ,” April 18, 1950. We’re going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good — Hillary Rodham
The New Jersey legislature recently responded to calls for reforming state automobile laws. Some claim that these laws will increase competition. Given the track record of this legislature in regulating auto insurance, there are good reasons to be wary of this legislation. Does it really improve this situation overall, or is it just another payoff
Under the title of Market Madness , Mariusz Doszyn of Znet (one of the left’s most important popular websites) interviews Michael Albert, a writer for Z and the South End Press and a proponent of “participatory economics”—apparently a euphemism for another of variety of socialism. The interview is particularly interesting for Austrians in as much
In February, Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake famously gave the world a new perspective on the term “pop music.” During the Superbowl half-time show, Timberlake grabbed the right bra cup of Jackson ‘s leather outfit, and exposed her breast to the world. In more ways than one, it was probably the most exposure Jackson had gotten for a
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.