U.S. Economy

Murray Rothbard on the immediate postwar period: For a while the postwar ideological climate seemed to

There’s no doubt that prosperity has smiled brighter and brighter on the last four generations.

You may say it another way: that the intentions of mass production cannot be realized unless management and labor are both free. So long as that freedom existed in the motorcar industry, the cost of an automobile went lower and lower until it became, pound for pound, the cheapest manufactured thing in the world, not the Ford car only but all cars; and automobile labor at the same time was the highest-paid labor of its kind in the world.

Whenever the public doesn’t get what it wants and consumer demand is subservient to corporate interest, the most likely culprit is government policy. On the free market, consumers drive production, whereas under a system of protectionist corporatism, politicians and bureaucrats guide the market.

Charles K. Eames writes:

When the state is sued, liability ultimately falls upon the taxpayers, not the politicians and bureaucrats.

After the Great Depression hit, there was a general air in the United States and Europe that freedom hadn’t worked well. What we needed were strong leaders to manage and plan economies and societies.

And how they were worshiped—disgustingly so!

A new book by NYU Professor William Silber has just come out offering an explanation for

Boom-busts were a feature of markets. Under consumption caused the depression. WWII ended the Great Depression. All three Keynesian beliefs were inaccurate. Only the Austrian Business Cycle Theory got it right.

MSNBC runs a funny picture of the White House response to the news that economic growth is at a fou