Category Archive: 6b.) Mises.org

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How the Fed’s 2008 Mortgage Experiment Fueled Today’s Housing Crisis

2023-03-18

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2023-03-18

How should Congress assess the Federal Reserve’s track record as an investor in residential mortgage-backed securities (MBS)? Regardless of Fed spin, it merits a failing grade. The Fed’s COVID-era intervention in the mortgage markets fueled the second real estate bubble of the 21st century. The bubble ended when the Fed stopped purchasing MBS and raised rates to fight inflation. While time will tell whether recent increases in home prices are...

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Anatomy of the Bank Run

2023-03-18

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2023-03-18

[This article is featured in chapter 79 of Making Economic Sense by Murray Rothbard and originally appeared in the September, 1985 edition of The Free Market]  It was a scene familiar to any nostalgia buff: all-night lines waiting for the banks (first in Ohio, then in Maryland) to open; pompous but mendacious assurances by the bankers that all is well and that the people should go home; a stubborn insistence by depositors to get their money out;...

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Influencers and Subjective Value: They Have Something to Teach Us

2023-03-17

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2023-03-17

In 2022, investments into the creator economy surged to $5 billion. The term creator refers to people who generate value from intellectual output or artistic work. However, a new form of creative has emerged known as the “influencer.” Influencers are online personalities who, through their charisma, cultivate a loyal fanbase. Due to their reach, brands employ influencers to market their products and services. Influencer marketing has proven to be a...

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Ready for Retirement? Fewer and Fewer Americans Are Saving for That Time

2023-03-17

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2023-03-17

Because of inflation and a lack of a savings ethic, Americans are less prepared for retirement than ever. The numbers are discouraging. Original Article: "Ready for Retirement? Fewer and Fewer Americans Are Saving for That Time" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.

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Bankers and Bailouts Are Ripping Us Off

2023-03-17

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2023-03-17

Ryan and Tho talk about how last week's banking panic led to new ways for bankers and politicians to exploit regular people through inflation, regulations, and corrupt loans. Be sure to follow Radio Rothbard at Mises.org/RadioRothbard.

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Help Us Publish Professor Hülsmann’s New Book

2023-03-17

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2023-03-17

I am excited to tell you about a new book project from our brilliant Senior Fellow, Jörg Guido Hülsmann. I just finished the manuscript, and let me tell you: this is a remarkable work. That is why I’m writing you—as part of a select group of Mises Institute Supporters and fans of Dr. Hülsmann’s work. We know you will want to be listed in the book as a Supporter! I’ll introduce the book with some simple questions: Why are people mostly good? Why do...

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Nonmeasure for Nonmeasure

2023-03-17

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2023-03-17

Nomocratic Pluralism: Plural Values, Negative Liberty, and the Rule of Lawby Kenneth B. McIntyrePalgrave Macmillan, 2021; xii + 214 pp. Kenneth McIntyre, a political theorist and historian who teaches at Sam Houston State University, addresses one of the most difficult questions in political philosophy in his excellent book. It is a question that should interest everyone who wants a free society. McIntyre sets forward his answer with an immense...

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Yearning for Beauty in the Truth of Economic Thinking

2023-03-17

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2023-03-17

Those adhering to Austrian Economic thinking see the beauty in concepts coming together and providing a way to truthfully assess human action. Original Article: "Yearning for Beauty in the Truth of Economic Thinking" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.

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The Bank of England: Money Creation in Their Own Words

2023-03-17

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2023-03-17

In March 2014 the world’s oldest central bank, the Bank of England (BoE), did every advocate of sound money a big but unintentional favor by publishing an official introduction to and an official detailed account of unsound money. Given both the importance of and the lack of publicity regarding these two seminal papers over the past nine years, even here at mises.org, the focus in this piece will be on quoting some of the BoE’s “greatest hits.”...

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No, We Don’t Need More Nuclear Weapons

2023-03-17

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2023-03-17

Republicans and Democrats may quibble over how federal tax dollars might be spent on various social welfare programs like Medicaid and food stamps. But alongside Social Security, there is one area of federal spending that everyone can apparently agree on: military spending. Last year, the Biden administration requested one of the largest peacetime budgets ever, at $813 billion. Congress wanted even more spending and ended up approving a budget of...

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The Censored Generation

2023-03-16

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2023-03-16

Never before have we seen an entire generation of young Americans being censored—and self-censoring—for making innocuous statements. This does not end well. Original Article: "The Censored Generation" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.

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Reparations Are a Statist Cudgel for Bludgeoning Property Owners

2023-03-16

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2023-03-16

San Francisco’s panel on reparations has issued a recommendation that qualified black residents in that city receive $5 million in reparations for the financial effects of slavery and/or racial discrimination. There was never slavery in the city of San Francisco, but the panel nevertheless suggested that city inhabitants must atone for racial discrimination. Such calls for reparations to black people are based on the notion of collective white...

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Why Biden’s Spending Is Unsustainable

2023-03-16

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2023-03-16

It's popular for politicians to claim they will never cut Social Security. But doing nothing now about the program means imposing an even larger hit on seniors in the future.  Original Article: "Why Biden's Spending Is Unsustainable" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.

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The Fear of Mass Unemployment due to Artificial Intelligence and Robotics Is Unfounded

2023-03-16

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2023-03-16

People are arguing over whether artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics will eliminate human employment. People seem to have an all-or-nothing belief that either the use of technology in the workplace will destroy human employment and purpose or it won’t affect it at all. The replacement of human jobs with robotics and AI is known as “technological unemployment.” Although robotics can turn materials into economic goods in a fraction of the time...

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Money Supply Growth Went Negative for the Third Month in a Row, and Is Near a Thirty-Five-Year Low

2023-03-15

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2023-03-15

With negative growth now dipping below –5 percent, money-supply contraction is approaching the biggest declines we've seen in the past thirty-five years. Original Article: "Money Supply Growth Went Negative for the Third Month in a Row, and Is Near a Thirty-Five-Year Low" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.

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Libertarian Law by Democratic Means: Utilitarianism and the Demythologization of Authority

2023-03-15

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2023-03-15

I have previously explained how for Ludwig von Mises, democracy is necessary for the libertarian society because of its usefulness in achieving and maintaining social peace, insofar as social peace is a prerequisite for economic and civil liberty. This time I want to explain an idea that is implicit in Mises’s subjectivist philosophy and that leads him to defend democracy, understood as the consent of the governed, but which may go unnoticed...

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The “Meritocracy” Was Created by and for the Progressive Ruling Class

2023-03-15

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2023-03-15

All of Al Gore's children went to Harvard. Are we really to believe that this is because the Gore kids had the most "merit"? The only real  meritocracy is in the marketplace.  Original Article: "The "Meritocracy" Was Created by and for the Progressive Ruling Class" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.

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Silicon Valley Bank and the Failure of Fractional Reserve Banking

2023-03-15

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2023-03-15

With the apparent failure of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) potentially causing a crisis in the American and even the global financial system, we will be treated to all manner of explanations, very few of which will accurately state the cause of these troubles: fractional reserve banking. In modern banking there is little separation between warehouse and investment banking. The downside of investment banking is a potential loss of money since no...

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Looming Bank Failures Point to More Price Inflation as Real Wages Fall Again

2023-03-15

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2023-03-15

The federal government’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released new price inflation data today, and according to the report, price inflation during the month decelerated slightly, coming in at the lowest year-over-year increase in eighteen months. According to the BLS, Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation rose 6.0 percent year over year in February before seasonal adjustment. That’s down from January’s year-over-year increase of 6.4 percent, and...

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The Theory and Practice of Conspiracy

2023-03-14

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2023-03-14

Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations in 1776, at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. The book was the result of twenty years of observation of human action and identification of the mechanisms and processes that lead to economic efficiency and to our well-being. The book was written at a time when guilds had not yet completely disappeared, even though it was already known that the guild system was a brake on innovation and freedom of...

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