Tag Archives: On Politics

Numbers from Bizarro-World The past few months have been really challenging for anyone invested in gold or silver; for me personally as well. Despite serious warning signs in the economy, staggering debt levels and a multitude of significant geopolitical threats at play, the rally in risk assets seemed to continue unabated. In fact, I was struggling with this seeming paradox myself. As I kept looking at the state of...

Schemes and Shams Man’s willful determination to resist the natural order are in vain.  Still, he pushes onward, always grasping for the big breakthrough. The allure of something for nothing is too enticing to pass up. Systems of elaborate folly have been erected with the most impossible of promises.  That prosperity can be attained without labor.  That benefits can be paid without taxes.  That cheap credit can make...

  Smug Central Planners Looking back at the past decade, it would be easy to conclude that central planners have good reason to be smug. After all, the Earth is still turning. The “GFC” did not sink us, instead we were promptly gifted the biggest bubble of all time –  in everything, to boot. We like to refer to it as the GBEB (“Great Bernanke Echo Bubble”) in order to make sure its chief architect is not forgotten....

Sarah Westall Interviews Claudio Grass Last month our friend Claudio Grass, roving Mises Institute Ambassador and a Switzerland-based investment advisor specializing in precious metals, was interviewed by Sarah Westall for her Business Game Changers channel. Sarah Westall and Claudio Grass There are two interviews, both of which are probably of interest to our readers. The first one focuses on Switzerland with its...

  Maurice Jackson Speaks with Jayant Bhandari About Emerging Market Currencies, the Trade War, US Foreign Policy and More Maurice Jackson of Proven & Probable has recently conducted a new interview with our friend and occasional contributor to this site, Jayant Bhandari, who is inter alia the host of the annual Capitalism and Morality seminar. Maurice Jackson (left) and Jayant Bhandari (right) A wide range of...

  Introductory Remarks: The “Anti-Politician” Godfrey Bloom, by PT Most of our readers will probably remember former UKIP chief whip and European Parliament representative Godfrey Bloom. As far as we know, he is the only politician who ever raised the issue of the workings of the fractionally reserved central bank-directed monetary system in the EU parliament. This system is of course central to the phenomenon of the...

Incrementum Advisory Board Discussion Q3 2018 with Special Guest Kevin Duffy “From a marketing perspective it pays to be overconfident, especially in the short term. The higher your conviction the easier it will be to market your investment ideas. I think the Austrian School is at a disadvantage here because it’s more difficult to be confident about your qualitative predictions and even in terms of investment advice it...

Voting with their Feet A couple of recent articles have once more made the case, at least implicitly, for political decentralization as the only viable path which will begin to solve the seemingly insurmountable political, economic, and social crises which the Western world now faces. Fracture lines – tax and regulatory competition allows people to “vote with their feet” – and they certainly do. - Click to enlarge In...

Effects of Monetary Pumping on the Real World As long time readers know, we are looking at the economy through the lens of Austrian capital and monetary theory (see here for a backgrounder on capital theory and the production structure). In a nutshell: Monetary pumping falsifies interest rate signals by pushing gross market rates below the rate that reflects society-wide time preferences; this distorts relative prices...

Meandering Prices Prices rise and prices fall.  So, too, they fall and rise.  This is how the supply and demand sweet spot is continually discovered – and rediscovered. When supply exceeds demand for a good or service, prices fall. Conversely, when demand exceeds supply, prices rise. Supply and DemandSupply and demand (the curves usually shown in such charts are unrealistic, as bids and offers in the market are...