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The Henry Hazlitt Memorial Lecture, sponsored by Harvey and Mei Allison. Recorded at the 2023 Austrian Economics Research Conference hosted at the Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, March 16–18, 2023. [embedded content] The Austrian Economics Research Conference is the international, interdisciplinary meeting of the Austrian School, bringing together leading scholars doing research in this vibrant and influential intellectual tradition. The conference is...

Advocates for more military spending tell us the taxpayer must pay to expand the US's nuclear arsenal.  Because of China. In truth, the US's arsenal is in no danger of not "keeping up." Original Article: "No, We Don't Need More Nuclear Weapons" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.  [embedded content]...

Keynesian economists claim that cost cutting by companies in order to protect profits can lead to an economic slump. They believe that if everyone tries to cut costs, demand from retrenched workers for goods and services weakens, and as a result corporate revenues and profits come under pressure. This necessitates new layoffs, and the downward spiral accelerates. Popular thinking presents economic activity as a circular flow of money: spending by one individual...

The Murray N. Rothbard Memorial Lecture, sponsored by Steven and Cassandra Torello. Recorded at the 2023 Austrian Economics Research Conference hosted at the Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, March 16–18, 2023. [embedded content] The Austrian Economics Research Conference is the international, interdisciplinary meeting of the Austrian School, bringing together leading scholars doing research in this vibrant and influential intellectual tradition. The...

Drug addicts suffer major withdrawal symptoms when they go cold turkey. In the case of high-tech startups and their banks (like Silicon Valley Bank), the super-low-interest-rate stimulant has been taken away by the drug dealer (the Fed) via interest rate hikes. With cheap credit drying up, firms switched to pulling cash out of SVB, all while the same interest rate increases caused the value of SVB’s assets to fall. SVB’s balance sheet couldn’t handle the fast...

Central banks usually don't admit their guilt in the destruction of money, but the Bank of England unwittingly comes clean. Original Article: "The Bank of England: Money Creation in Their Own Words" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.  [embedded content] Tags: Featured,newsletter

The more powerful a government, the more likely it is to engage in war and conquest. Case in point: US involvement in Ukraine. In 2014 the US led a coup that displaced a “democratically elected” president, Viktor Yanukovych. In November 2013, . . . Yanukovych rejected a major economic deal he had been negotiating with the EU and decided to accept a $15 billion Russian counteroffer instead. That decision gave rise to antigovernment demonstrations that escalated over...

Overview: There did not appear to be any negative surprises over the weekend, and this is helping calm investors' nerves at the start of the new week. Deutsche Bank shares have recovered most of the pre-weekend loss in the German market, and Stoxx bank index is posting a gain for the first time in four sessions. The AT1 ETF is slightly softer. In Japan, the Topix bank index slipped around 0.5%, its fourth decline in the past five sessions. Asia Pacific equities were...

Part I of II The recent turmoil that has roiled the global banking sector has placed central bankers in an impossible position: Cut rates and avert a domino-style disaster in the industry and a possible deep and prolonged recession in the wider economy or stay the hiking course to combat the still untamed inflationary pressures? Arguably the great losers in both cases will be the taxpayers and the average working household.  The recent turmoil in the...

The resulting erosion of collateral will collapse the global credit bubble, a repricing/reset that will bankrupt the global economy and financial system. Scrape away the complexity and every economic crisis and crash boils down to the precarious asymmetry between collateral and the debt secured by that collateral collapsing. It’s really that simple. In eras of easy credit, both creditworthy and marginal borrowers are suddenly able to borrow more. This flood of new...