Free Markets

Fortunately, Austrian economists have shown that every product and service can be offered privately, without the use of monopoly force through government.

The free market doesn't pump up the money supply and push interest rates down to levels that promote unsustainable bubbles. The free market punishes reckless risk takers, while it is government that bails them out (and thereby encourages them to take greater risks in the future).

In holding money, its owner gains in the satisfaction of being able to meet instantly, as they unpredictably arise, the widest range of future contingencies.

Genuine market economies — meaning those that maximize the long-term benefits to consumers and producers — thrive when state power is minimized. With this in mind, abolishing the FAA and firing its bureaucrats who hinder the market order would constitute a step in the right direction.

Both books seek to explain the strange elitism of the Left and its opposition to capitalism for the masses. And they both discern that the answer lies in the way that the market is so slavishly devoted to serving the needs of the average person as opposed to society's philosopher kings.

"The costs of an incorrect view of industrial history can be substantial."

In his own critical work, Hayek was not satisfied with a challenge to the main thesis of an opponent. He responded to every argument advanced in the adversary's work.

Meanwhile, such a system of "extended liability" for homeowners would have prevented the extra stress on banks caused by negative-equity defaulters. Because these people would know they are paying back the full sum either way, they would instead keep the house and pay back the (albeit, exorbitant when considering the plummeting value of their home) debt over time — perhaps while keeping their home, if they had proof of income.

Right now, as the economy reshuffles, there are more opportunities to generate change than ever — the kind of dynamic change that we need to grow out of this slump.

In 1956, Mises showed how the supposed failures of the market economy were failures of the state and documented the traits of anticapitalism. In 2009, the facts have changed but the message remains the same.