Orders in capital goods have been going up since 2009. Normally, capital goods purchases suggest economic growth, but if the orders are a result of easy money, the purchases point not to wealth creation, but to a bubble.
Not unlike governments, ponzi schemer Bernie Madoff used his victims' money to exhibit his "generosity" through charitable giving projects.
When the day of reckoning comes, will anyone criticize the Federal Reserve for making the unsustainable debt-fueled spending spree possible?
Long-term interest rates are going down, but many Fed observers, relying on expectations theory, wrongly think they should be going up. If we understand Mises and time preference, however, we can see the true trend much more clearly.
The trucking industry has historically offered many opportunities for small-scale owner-operators and laborers alike. Government management of the industry, however, from environmental regulations to labor guidelines, have cut deep into trucker productivity, all the while raising prices for both consumers and producers who depend on trucking.
My journey with Austrian economics and the Mises Institute began in 1992.
Supporters of minimum wage hikes claim that such hikes have little or no effect on employment, but the law of demand makes it clear that the effects of such price controls are very real.
The Fed and it’s friends blamed cold weather for much of the year’s lackluster economic growth.
