Tag Archives: 6b) Mises.org

At the conclusion of the BRICS summit in Johannesburg on August 24, 2023, it was announced that the five-country grouping of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, had invited six more countries to join: Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, and Argentina. The new memberships, which will take effect in January 2024, were called “historic” by Chinese leader Xi Jinping, while Vladimir Putin, unable to travel due to an International...

More than forty years ago, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn urged his fellow Russians “not to live by lies.” In our politicized age, his words ring truer than ever. Original Article: Totalitarian Ideals and Not Living by Lies [embedded content] Tags: Featured,newsletter

Libertarian Autobiographies: Moving toward Freedom in Today’s Worldedited by Jo Ann Cavallo and Walter E. BlockPalgrave Macmillan, 2023; xx + 533 pp. Jo Ann Cavallo and Walter Block have done those interested in libertarianism a great service, but they have set the reviewer of their book an impossible task. They have gathered together eighty short accounts in which well-known libertarians describe their various paths toward their political and economic beliefs. In...

On this episode of Radio Rothbard, Ryan McMaken and Tho Bishop take a look at "classical liberalism," a term that has come to mean a variety of different things in recent years. What is the history of classical liberalism? Is classical liberalism distinct from radical libertarianism? Is it ultimately a moderate form of leftism? Ryan and Tho address these questions and more during the Mises Institute's Fall Fundraising Campaign. If you're a fan of Radio...

If we read between the lines, it is apparent that the Fed is hoping that price inflation will fall to politically acceptable levels without any additional tightening, and without a recession.  But "hope" is all the Fed has.  Original Article: The Fed Holds the Fed Funds Rate Steady—Because it Doesn't Know What Else To Do [embedded content]...

Today marks the birthday of Ludwig von Mises, and day 5 of our annual Fall Campaign. The intellectual achievements of Ludwig von Mises make him one of the greatest minds in human history. His contributions to Austrian economics inspired new generations of scholars, from Murray Rothbard and F.A. Hayek to current leaders like Joe Salerno, Ron Paul, and Patrick Newman. He is the most powerful intellectual opponent to socialism the world has ever known, and his work on...

But once a commodity is established as a money on the market, no more money at all is needed. —Murray Rothbard, Taking Money Back The Fed’s distinguishing characteristic is its grant of privilege to buy assets with money it doesn’t have. No other person or institution can legally do this; those that tried would be indicted for counterfeiting. At the very least you might think this would raise eyebrows, but it doesn’t except in fringe quarters. It is simply part of...

Just-wage theory tells us that an employer cannot reduce his workers' wages below some presumed "cost of living." Yet, that same employer can be permitted to reduce the worker's wage to zero if the worker has been replaced by a machine.  Original Article: Why the "Just Wage" Theory Doesn't Make Much Sense [embedded content]...

If we search the news from 2007, we can find plenty of headlines with the IMF and the Federal Reserve predicting a soft landing. No one seemed to worry about rising imbalances. The main reason is that market participants and economists like to believe that the central bank will manage the economy as if it were a car. The current optimism about the U.S. economy reminds us of the same sentiment in 2007. Many readers will argue that this time is different, and we will...

The US consumer sentiment index, compiled by the University of Michigan, fell to 69.5 in August from 71.6 in July. A weakening consumer sentiment index is seen as indicating a potential downturn in consumer spending and the economy in general. Most economic commentators agree that individual consumption rather than saving is the key to economic prosperity. Saving, they believe, hinders economic growth because it coincides with weakening demand for goods. In this...