On October 17, 2024, Jonathan Newman appeared on Wake-Up Call with Bill Lundun to discuss Austrian economics, Donald Trump, and mainstream economists.
The original episode is available at News Radio 1120 KPNW.
Bill Lundun (BL): News Radio 1120 KPNW, thanks for being with us this morning. We have like two different things that we keep hearing when it comes to this particular election period. And it is that Americans overall trust Trump more on the economy. And that’s we’re talking about voters, whereas the so-called experts don’t. Who to believe to discuss it this morning? It is Dr. Jonathan Newman. He is a fellow at the Mises Institute, which is a nonprofit that promotes the teaching and research in the Austrian School of Economics. And it’s in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard. And welcome to the show. We appreciate you being here with us. Thank you, Jonathan.
Jonathan Newman (JN): Hey, thanks for having me.
BL: Yeah. Talk a little bit about Ludwig von Mises and kind of what he stood for in his branch of, if you will, economic research.
JN: Sure, Ludwig von Mises is sort of the godfather of Austrian economics, which is a school of economic thought that’s very free market. We don’t do a lot of mathematical modeling. We consider the individual as having subjective value, and through people’s subjective values, they interact in markets, creating market prices, and those market prices are fundamental for developing an economy, for understanding how resources should be allocated. We should be using the profit and loss test to determine how to most efficiently produce things. And so many of the conclusions of the Austrian school are very free market. And of course, Ludwig von Mises was one of the you know the main figures in Austrian economics. He started his career, obviously in Austria, that’s why the name of the school’s called Austrian economics. But he had to flee the Nazis. So he was he was under pressure from the Nazis, because he was saying things that were critical of government. Obviously he had to flee that area, and he came over to the United States in New York. And had a very famous seminar where many American economists and others were listening to him, and he sort of sparked the Austrian movement in the United States. And so it’s grown and flourished since then, and we have the Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, that champions his ideas, champions Austrian economics, and is trying to educate everybody about the best way to think about the economy, the best way to analyze policy proposals from politicians and bureaucrats, and promote free markets along the way.
BL: If he were to see the markets today and the way that things are, if you will, manipulated in a number of ways, the way the government policy attempts to manipulate things, what would be his takeaway, do you think?
JN: I think Mises would be most disturbed by the fiat money system that we have in place today. So in the United States, we have the Federal Reserve, which is our central bank. They are the ones who are controlling the supply of money. They’re manipulating interest rates. And Mises would pin the blame on this monetary policy by the Federal Reserve for creating booms and busts, for creating these artificial booms where employment goes up, stock prices go up, everything seems to be going well, and then all of a sudden it crashes. And so one of the crown jewels of Austrian economics is Austrian business cycle theory, which explains how it’s actually government manipulation in credit markets that causes these booms and busts, that causes the business cycle. So he would definitely not like that, but he also, just in terms of the general effects of inflation, he would say that the fact that savings rates are way down, nobody’s really saving for the future, is because people’s money is losing value. And so it doesn’t really make any sense to save money for retirement if that money is going to be losing its purchasing power over time. And so that forces people to save for retirement, for example, by investing in the volatile stock markets. So he would obviously, he would disagree with the monetary policy, he would disagree with the size and scope of government as it exists today, and he would champion a more free market approach, where markets are the ones that are and regulating themselves, where consumers are the ones that are deciding which companies are producing things that we like, and use the profit and loss test of the market to rationally and efficiently allocate factors of production, so that we have a growing progressing economy.
BL: Alright. To the very basic question. In polling, there’s been a lot of polling in regards to this, and that Americans actually trust Trump on the economy, and yet we have these experts, call them so-called or call them actual experts, that don’t and the question is so who to believe
JN: Well, I definitely wouldn’t put much faith in the so-called experts. The so-called experts have been wrong about so many things in the past. And so I think that the reason why people think that Trump and the Republican Party represents more of a... would represent a turn towards a stronger economy is because they’re really the only ones that are talking about decreasing, or at least limiting, the increases in the size and scope of government. So if you look at the rhetoric and the proposals from Democrats, there’s this problem in the United States and we can solve it with more government intervention and more government spending. There’s this other problem that we can solve with more government intervention and more government spending. And yet only on the Trump side, you have at least some rhetoric about how we need more efficiency in government, we need to decrease the size and scope of government. And so people realize that a lot of the problems that the Democrats are pointing out are ones that are caused or exacerbated by government spending and government intervention. And so it makes sense that Americans are sort of doubtful that the Democrats have any sort of a good plan regarding a stronger economy.
BL: What about the criticism that has been made because, you know, Trump has once again talked about tariffs, in particular regarding China, and a lot of the, as we’ve talked about them, the experts are like, “Oh my God, it’s going to do these horrible things to the economy. It’s going to cause prices to spike again.” What’s your take on that?
JN: I think it’s a valid criticism. I think it’s good to be distrustful of tariffs because, I mean, in the end a tariff is a tax. And so I’m not going to be the one that says, you know, everything that Trump has ever proposed is a free market and it’s going to be good for the economy. But, of course, what Trump is seeing and what the people in the Republican party are seeing is, you know, hollowed out manufacturing in the United States. They see, you know, loss of jobs. So they see these sorts of the things happening, and so they think the tariffs would be a good way to address it. I think that economic theory going all the way back to the 1700s, I mean, you can go back to Richard Cantillon, to Adam Smith, to those guys. And I think that they very compellingly showed that tariffs and protectionism is not a good way to address those sorts of problems. But, in terms of the grand scheme of things, if we’re arguing over should we have, you know, this tariff rate versus that marginally different tariff rate, then that’s sort of a side issue. Really, the main thing that I think people are focused on is inflation. It’s all of the regulations that are imposed on the economy by the government. It’s those sorts of things. So, yes, I do have some quibbles with the with the tariff idea, but I still think that it makes sense that Americans are trusting the Trump side and really the distrust of the establishment and the distrust of the so-called experts.
BL: Right. You know, one of the things that you hear from the public individuals is, you know, “I just want to see prices come down,” and you look at it and I don’t remember any time that prices, maybe a little bit here and there, where once you have a period of inflation, with maybe the exception of gas prices, where prices fall and come down. Unless we’re talking about a major case of deflation, which is a whole other you know a whole a whole other can of worms that can be actually worse than inflation. Talk a little bit about that whole idea of prices coming down.
JN: I think people are worried about deflation for the wrong reasons. And I think the reason that they’re worried about is because they associate it with what happened during the Great Depression, where we had a huge increase in unemployment, where output shrank, and we also had price deflation happening at the same time. And so people sort of associate those things. They think deflation is associated with recessions. But it’s worth pointing out that there are quite a few things that could result in deflation. And one of the healthiest periods of, you know, economic growth in the United States happened when we were under a gold standard, where output was increasing but the money supply was not increasing by the same amount. And so we had, you know, steady deflation. And we didn’t have – it was a long-term steady deflation that promoted savings that allowed – made it easy – for businesses and for consumers and households to make decisions over the long term. It made it easy for people to save with money as opposed to investing in the stock market. And so if your money is gaining value over time, then you can imagine how that would totally restructure the way that the whole economy is allocating resources. So, if money is gaining value over time, then people have an incentive to save. If people are saving, then we have more capital accumulation. If we have more capital accumulation, then our economy can grow in a sustainable sort of way as opposed to the booms and busts that we have now. So, I think the fear of deflation, or deflation-phobia as some people call it, is just based on that one episode in economic history in the United States where I think we should be more comfortable with the idea of our money gaining purchasing power over time, and it could be a very healthy sort of thing.
BL: How is that going to happen though? Because you mentioned and you started off by qualifying it with, “While we were under the gold standard.” It’s a completely different valuation of the way that the dollar is factored right now. Can that could that happen again on a federal reserve system like we have?
JN: Oh, absolutely not. Going back to that sort of system of sound money, and I’m not saying that it has to be a gold standard, but going back to a system where, you know, government is not intervening in money and banking, would require a huge shift. It would require a shift in people’s thinking and the way that they vote. It would have to require, you know, ending the Federal Reserve, or at least severely limiting its power. And so you’re absolutely right that, you know, going back to a system like that, it would require a big change. But the really the first thing that people think about when somebody proposes ending the Federal Reserve or auditing the Federal Reserve or limiting its power is, they think, “Well, what about deflation?” or “What about booms and busts?” And really what Austrian economists are saying is that, if we did get rid of the Fed, then we would actually have a smoother economic growth. We would have stable deflation where people’s money is growing in purchasing power. We wouldn’t have all the booms and busts, because Austrian economists point out that it’s manipulated interest rates that result in those artificial booms and the painful busts that follow. So, you’re absolutely right. It would require a big shift. If people are interested in how we would actually reach that stage where we could go back to sound money as opposed to political money, fiat money, then I recommend that listeners check out the writings by Murray Rothbard. If they go to Mises.org/MyMoney, then they’ll receive a free reading from Rothbard, a PDF, where they can get it mailed to them. And so there’s great plans offered by Rothbard, a great Austrian economist, that would explain how we get there.
BL: All right. Appreciate you joining us on the Wake Up Call. Dr. Jonathan Newman here on KPNW. Thanks again.
JN: Thanks for having me.
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