Mises Wire

One of the great myths about the capitalist system is the presumption that businessmen make profits at the expense of the consumers and workers in society. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Mises Daily Thursday:

Politicians are telling us that we need the government to ensure "neutrality" in how broadband resources are allocated. However, not only is neutrality in allocation impossible, the effort to do so only hands more power over to the politicians while rendering consumers powerless.

Mises Daily Wednesday: The ideal reform is always the elimination of the Fed and other central banks. But given the fact that Austrians understand the monetary system better than others, it's important that Austrians also seek to limit the harm the Fed is doing through less-than-ideal reforms.

Once upon a time, the Chinese were the enemies of private property rights and free markets, and the Americans were the enemies of the Chinese and purported to cherish the institutions that the Chinese hated. Today no such clear-cut difference exists. If anything, today’s Chinese in high places seem to be more inclined to say kind words about private property rights and the free market than are comparably placed Americans.

In this audio interview, economist and former Mises Fellow Shawn Ritenour, and author of Foundations of Economics: a Christian View, breaks down how markets work.

As a historian, my training is about analyzing the past. Those times I have strayed into predicting the future, I have failed pretty spectacularly. And yet, the installation of the new Secretary of State Ashton Carter makes me look a bit prophetic after all!

Lew Rockwell: I have two suggestions for you, and they both involve new books by Tom Woods.

I just returned from the Austrian Student Scholars Conference at Grove City College and boy, I was impressed.

More evidence the future of Austrian economics is in good hands is Patrick Newman’s excellent piece of scholarship recently published in the QJAE as "The Depression of 1873: An Austrian Perspective."

Jeff Deist interviews John O'Donnell in this week's Mises Weekends.