One of my pet peeves with Paul Krugman is his constant rewriting of history, a rewriting that just happens to coincide with left-wing political talking points. For example, we hear that the Great Depression occurred because Herbert Hoover was a staunch believer in laissez-faire and took the advice of Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon, who called
Comedian Steve Martin once did a standup act in which he asked the audience in an incredulous tone, “You mean, you don’t remember when we had nuclear war and the earth was wiped out?” The audience would laugh, as expected, since the entire idea was ridiculous. While Steve Martin isn’t writing columns about the current global financial dealings, he
With the news Wednesday of the Federal Reserve’s one-half percent cut in its discount rate, the stock markets went ballistic. The Dow Jones Industrial Average increased by just under 400 points, and even the recently anemic NASDAQ index ended the day above 2,000 points. By the time you have finished reading this article, it is likely that the
In February, 2001, I saw the end of the credit-filled boom , as the stock market went bust, and predicted recessionary times, which soon followed. It seems, however, that Washington, D.C., is one great big toga party, and if it is true that Blutarsky of “Animal House” became Senator Blutarsky (as the film’s credits tell us at the end), perhaps
I recently heard a radio interview with a prominent economist who was defending Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke’s moves to shore up the markets on Wall Street. Bernanke, the economist said with emphasis, had spent years studying the “mistakes” of the Fed during the Great Depression and was not going to repeat the “errors” that the Fed
In a recent column, Paul Krugman tries to explain the “Bush bust.” Instead of clear, cogent economic theory, we are fed a mass of contradictory ideas, a bit of political partisanship, and explanations that simply make no sense. When one attempts to apply economic theory in order to explain certain events, one is reminded of Carl Menger’s dictum:
As a long-time critic of the part-time economist and full-time political partisan Paul Krugman, I would be remiss if I did not give him at least some credit for being able to point out the obvious: Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme really is a prototype for the modern US economy. Yes, Krugman is right, but, alas, I am also required to add that a
The lead story of the March 9, 2009, edition of Newsweek says it all: “Stop Saving Now!” Writer Daniel Gross declares, For our $14 trillion economy to recover and thrive, hoarders must open their wallets and become consumers, and businesses must once again be willing to roll the dice. Nobody is advocating a return to the debt-fueled days of
All of us who warmly remember Animal House can recall the scene at the end in which the band is trying to walk through the wall at the end of the alley, having been led there by one of the pranksters from Delta House. Obviously, like the rest of the movie, this moment is an absurdity, but nonetheless I can think of no better way to describe Paul
As one who has made a career out of criticizing government and exposing the various predations of government, one would think I would be intelligent and wise enough not to expect that entity we know as “good government.” In fact, given that I am quite familiar with the entire socialist calculation debate and have assigned numerous papers covering
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.