[NOTE: An earlier version of this piece stirred up controversy and comment on all sides. This longer version addresses some of the points made by critics.] It was peace and prosperity versus taxation, inflationism, protectionism, imperialism, and war. The good guys win this one and people are applauding in theaters throughout the country. The
A crucial part of a national political campaign involves enlisting economists to endorse the candidates’ plan. Every four years, statements are circulated by the campaigns and economists are urged to sign up. Mises Institute adjunct scholar Mark Thornton, though certainly not a supporter of Gore, would not, as a matter of principle, sign the Bush
The Supreme Court has declined to put the antitrust case against Microsoft on fast track, decreasing the chances that the lower court and the antitrust division of the Justice Department will succeed in their efforts to break the company into two parts. To understand why this is a victory for consumers, consider a case 50 years ago when the
The government tells you that your taxes are being cut. What you may not have heard is that you may soon be drafted into an entirely separate tax system that receives very little public attention outside publications for tax accountants. The name of the second tier of tax is the AMT, the alternative minimum tax. If you work too hard, are too
Essay on the Nature of Commerce in General . By Richard Cantillon. (Transaction Publishers, September 2001, 194 pages) $24.95. This just-released edition of Richard Cantillon’s Essay on the Nature of Commerce in General is to be hailed as an important event. The book, originally published in 1755, long has been recognized as the first systematic
I was making my first airplane trip after the September 11 attack, and boy was I afraid. I was headed right up through Terrorist Alley—from Montgomery, Alabama, through Memphis, Tennessee, to St. Louis, Missouri, and back again. Old Bin Laden himself could not have designed such a daredevil adventure. The first thing you notice about the new and
As we await the release of George Lucas’s second Star Wars prequel, The Attack of the Clones, speculation builds on whether Lucas can return to the glory of the original Star Wars trilogy. While critics attacked Lucas for his leading-boy character, his young-girl queen, and his politically incorrect characters (Jar Jar Binks and the admiral with
Terrorists killed nearly three thousand people on September 11, 2001, but that figure is swamped by the number of people who die each year while waiting for an organ transplant. More than three thousand died in the year 2001 waiting for a kidney transplant. Thousands also died waiting for livers, hearts, and other vital organs, and the number of
If people are pro war, they are referred to as “hawks”; if they are pro peace, they are called “doves.” Interestingly, these monikers are also used to describe viewpoints on monetary policy, especially when it comes to members of the Federal Reserve Board’s Open Market Committee. Monetary doves tend to follow an “easy money” policy, while hawks
For a few billion dollars you might expect to be able to bribe some small third world country into cleaning up its act, to defend the property rights of its citizens, to provide a stable currency, and to establish a non-interventionist economic and foreign policy. With little Switzerlands and industrial revolutions developing around the globe, the
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.