January 6 marked the anniversary of Franklin Roosevelt’s famous 1941 “Four Freedoms” speech, and January 11 marked the anniversary of his 1944 State of the Union address, where he expanded on what he saw as its meaning. That makes this an appropriate time to recognize the cognitive dissonance in FDR’s view of freedom, cited to this day as
It is reported of the greatest economist whom I have personally known that he used to say that if he had seven sons they should all study economics. If this was meant to suggest the magnitude of the task economists have to solve, this heroic resolution cannot be highly enough commended. If it was meant to suggest that the study of economics is a
The Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics 21, no. 2 (Summer 2018). For the full issue, click here . [ The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2017 ., Hope Jahren, ed., Wilmington, Mass.: Mariner Books, 2017, 352 pp.] The Earth’s climate is extraordinarily complex. Unlike dinosaur fossils or organic chemistry or primate behavior, climate is
[Originally published as “Economic Science and Neoclassicism” in the Review of Austrian Economics: Winter 1999 ] For more than forty years, economists have routinely rejected the postulate that economic theory should be realistic. Ever since Milton Friedman (1953) sketchily outlined a positivistic methodology for economics, most students of our
Traditional studies on natural law and justice have been eclipsed by the development of a concept of economic science that has tried to apply a methodology originally formed for the natural sciences to the social sciences. According to this line of thought, the defining content of economic theory consists of the systematic application of a narrow
The golden rule—“Do to others as you would have them do to you” being the most common variant I have heard--may be the most common ethical touchstone for human interactions. After all, Simon Blackburn wrote in his 2001 book, Ethics , that the Golden Rule is “found in some form in almost every ethical tradition.” I doubt there is anyone I know who
Most economists are familiar with the controversy on the possibility of economic calculation under socialism, and with the fact that Ludwig von Mises and Oscar Lange were the two major protagonists of that debate. Many are also familiar with Lange’s ironic gibe that, for having posed the problem which Lange believed that socialism could readily
Practically all critiques of markets are fundamentally ignorant and never address the actual issue. And they’ve been ignorant in the same way for about (at least?) a century. The so-called “market socialist” response to Mises’ claim that socialism (the common/public ownership of the means of production) is impossible illustrates this. Real Prices
In a recent editorial at Jacobin magazine, it is argued that a “planned economy can actually work.” They start with something I have written about at least a dozen times recently: the definition of socialism. Let me not mince words: our ability to argue against the rising left’s socialism is going to depend on what exactly is being argued. If
Gross Domestic Product-B attempts to capture the added value of things we don’t pay for, such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Google and other digital services free to the user. B stands for benefits; the benefits consumers receive from free and subsidized services. It was devised by Erik Brynjolfsson, a professor at MIT, and is a work-in-progress. He
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.