U.S. History

The inability of modern philosophers to furnish any kind of argument for the maintenance of a government is a notorious weakness.

With the cumulative effects of inflation, the face values of our coins no longer has any relation to historic commodity value.

Delivered at the Mises Institute on July 6, 2006.

The New York Times does not mention Independence Day on its editorial page on the 4th of July.

Walter Block and Tom DiLorenzo have looked at Constitutional Economics, and determined that politics are not just another market. There is only a curious analogy to the public choice approach. Social contract theory has been used as an excuse for all types of state intervention.

There are labor market myths and there are labor union myths. The biggest myth is that capitalists always exploit the working class. Basic economics about marginal productivity theory contradicts this. Examples abound in all areas.

The interventionist myth is that Federal meddling in domestic or foreign economics can make anything better. Instead, meddling produced the American Great Depression. Doing nothing with a depression in 1920 produced resolution within eighteen months. Nobody hears of the depression of 1920-21.

This second myth about market failure is again a call for interventionism and support for bigger government. Natural monopolies don’t exist. The theory was made up after the fact. The only monopolies existing are those propped up by government privilege.

The myth of antitrust, the myth of the New Deal and labor union myths are three economic fallacies. All three declare that government must save capitalism from itself.