Money and Banks

Populism was in the air this week as ranchers in the Western US opposed the spread of federally-owned lands, and reformers in Switzerland look to a referendum on fractional reserve banking.

Jeff Deist and Claudio Grass a fascinating development for Austrians and libertarians.

Many people know that the Venezuelan economy is subject to byzantine price controls and other regulations. But on top of it all is a highly complex, bureaucratic, and damaging system of government-controlled monetary exchange rates.

Like the Greenspan Fed before it, the Yellen Fed has doubled down on easy money, but will trigger a crisis once it tries to inch toward more normal interest rates.

Happy New Year from everyone at the Mises Institute! After an exciting 2015 filled with important research and growth in our global reach, we look forward to 2016. We start the new year with a Mises Weekends from Judge Andrew P. Napolitano.

With a new funding package in place, the Jeddah Tower — on track to be to be the world’s next tallest skyscraper — is moving forward. Will it prove to be like the Burj Khalifa tower and signal the next bust?

As an exciting year comes to a close, we want to thank all of our incredible members that allow us to do the work we do in advancing Austrian economics, freedom, and peace.

Even when a boom is obvious, it is still in the interests of individual owners and consumers to keep it going.

In a recent exchange with Janet Yellen, Senator Ted Cruz blamed the Fed for being too "tight" with monetary policy, thus causing the financial crisis of 2008. Cruz is right that the Fed was at fault, but he's wrong about how.