Category Archive: 6b.) Mises.org

The Escalating Tensions in the Red Sea Are a Bad Omen

On New Year’s Eve, US Navy helicopters in the Red Sea engaged and sank three boats belonging to Yemen’s Houthis, killing ten. According to US Central Command, the boats were attacking a container ship and fired on the helicopters as they responded to the ship’s distress call. The encounter represents a significant escalation that risks forcing a whole new war on the American public and the Middle East. The Red Sea region has become one of the...

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Mises and Popper on Action

Many years ago, in “The Communist Road to Self-Enslavement” (included in After the Open Society, a collection of Karl Popper’s papers edited by Jeremy Shearmur), I discovered the following sentence: “Like myself, [Ludwig von Mises] appreciated that there was some common ground, and he knew that I had accepted his most fundamental theorems and that I greatly admired him for these.” As I respect both Popper and Mises as great thinkers, although...

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Good Logic Prevents Bad Regulation

Much onerous and harmful government regulation can be prevented by the application of well-known and well-understood principles of logic. I will use the recent regulations placed upon Americans in response to the so-called pandemic. I refer to the panoply of regulations that government enacted starting in 2020 as the covid control program. Application of proper logic would have eliminated the debate over the possible effectiveness of the...

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The Real Meaning of Inflation and Deflation

[Excerpted from Chapter 17 of Human Action.]   The services money renders are conditioned by the height of its purchasing power. Nobody wants to have in his cash holding a definite number of pieces of money or a definite weight of money; he wants to keep a cash holding of a definite amount of purchasing power. As the operation of the market tends to determine the final state of money's purchasing power at a height at which the supply of and the...

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Reflections on the Rothbard Graduate Seminar

I had the good fortune of attending the Rothbard Graduate Seminar (RGS) twice in succession, during the summers of 2020 and 2021. By that time, I was already quite familiar with the ideas of the Austrian School thanks to the many podcasts and recorded Mises University lectures, among much more, the Mises Institute has made freely available online. However, I likely never would have realized my own understanding of Ludwig von Mises’s economic works...

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Privatizing Roads Solves the Problem of Road Closures

While traveling recently, I was stuck in a terrible bout of traffic. Unbeknownst to me, West Virginia University’s fall graduation just ended, and I was caught in the middle of the seemingly endless stream of parents, relatives, and friends who were leaving the ceremony. To deal with this problem, the City of Morgantown closed down lanes and reserved them for exclusive use by graduation attendees. Though the city may have done a fine job handling...

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When Nationalism Fuels Decentralization and Secession: Lessons from the Cold War

[This article is chapter 6 of Breaking Away: The Case for Secession, Radical Decentralization, and Smaller Polities. Now available at Amazon and in the Mises Store.] During the early 1990s, as the world of the old Soviet Bloc was rapidly falling apart, the economist and historian Murray Rothbard saw it all for what it was: a trend of mass decentralization and secession unfolding before the world’s eyes. The old Warsaw Pact states of Poland,...

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Last Day to Give in 2023!

YOUR GIFT WILL HELP US DO MORE IN 2024. With your gift of $25 or more, you will receive a copy of Joe Salerno's The Progressive Road to Socialism. Recurring donors of $10 who give $100 will also receive a copy of The Progressive Road to Socialism and renew their Membership through 2024. DONATE TODAY!

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2023: A Year Reviewed

In this episode, Mark looks back at 2023 as a great year for the goals and prospects of the Mises Institute moving forward, but a very bad year for the State. Be sure to follow Minor Issues at Mises.org/MinorIssues. Get your free copy of Murray Rothbard's Anatomy of the State at Mises.org/IssuesFree.

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Sound Money Movement Strikes Gold in 2023

Against the backdrop of high inflation rates and geopolitical uncertainty, states are increasingly enacting measures that encourage saving in precious metals and even using gold and silver as money. With five bills signed into law in 2023, sound money reforms are gaining momentum across the United States. Money Metals Exchange’s Sound Money Defense League project has emerged as an influential force, actively engaging in legislative battles by...

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Time Is Running Out!

YOUR GIFT WILL HELP US DO MORE IN 2024. With your gift of $25 or more, you will receive a copy of Joe Salerno's The Progressive Road to Socialism. Recurring donors of $10 who give $100 will also receive a copy of The Progressive Road to Socialism and renew their Membership through 2024. Donate today!

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How the American Revolution Turned North American Foreign Trade on Its Head

[Chapter 1 of Rothbard's newly edited and released Conceived in Liberty, vol. 5: The New Republic: 1784–1791.] After peace came in 1783, the new republic faced a two-fold economic adjustment: to peacetime from the artificial production and trade patterns during the war, and to a far different trading picture than had existed before the war. The largest change between the two eras of peace was the shift in trading patterns resulting from...

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Central Banks Brought Inflation. Now they Bring Stagnation.

Although the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank’s message regarding interest rate cuts seems clear, reiterating their commitment to reducing inflation, the market is expecting between five and six interest rate cuts, between 125 and 150 basis points, in the next twelve months. This shows us the bubble bias of many investors. We live in a world where two generations of market participants have only seen rate cuts and massive liquidity...

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Federal Student Loans Drive Up College Tuition Levels

Like every other government program designed to make something “more affordable,” the student loan program has managed to drive college tuition to atmospheric levels and saddle students with massive levels of debt. Original Article: Federal Student Loans Drive Up College Tuition Levels

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Let them Merge: Foreign Acquisition of US Steel

Nippon Steel's proposal to merge with US Steel is meeting opposition from the usual suspects in Washington, not to mention Tucker Carlson. Their hysteria is off the charts. Original Article: Let them Merge: Foreign Acquisition of US Steel

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America’s Corn Crop Comes from “Corny” Subsidies

America's famous Corn Belt should better be known as the nation's Subsidy Belt.  Original Article: America's Corn Crop Comes from "Corny" Subsidies

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Tyler Cowen on the GOAT in Economics

Tyler Cowen is Holbert L. Harris Chair of Economics and chairman of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. With Alex Tabarrok, he runs the popular economics blog Marginal Revolution. Tyler joins Bob to discuss his latest book. Tyler's New Book for Free: Mises.org/HAP428a Tyler's Blog: Mises.org/HAP428b   Join Tom DiLorenzo, Joe Salerno, and Patrick Newman in Tampa on February 17: Mises.org/Tampa2024Use code "Action24" for 15% off...

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The Bad Deal That Was the New Deal: FDR’s Assault on Individual Rights

The New Deal’s War on the Bill of Rights: The Untold Story of FDR’s Concentration Camps, Censorship, and Mass Surveillanceby David T. BeitoIndependent Institute, 2023; x + 379 pp. Few if any readers of this column admire Franklin Roosevelt, but as the historian David Beito reminds us in this outstanding book, most of his professional colleagues rank Roosevelt among our greatest presidents, second only to Abraham Lincoln. Those who accord him this...

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When Medical Authorities Went Totalitarian: Understanding Covid Policies and Protocols

Review: The New Abnormal: The Rise of the Biomedical Security State Senator Rand Paul mentions Aaron Kheriaty’s The New Abnormal: The Rise of the Biomedical State in his book Deception: The Great Covid Cover-Up. Dr. Kheriaty’s online biography includes the following information: Dr. Kheriaty is a plaintiff in the landmark free speech case Missouri v. Biden challenging government censorship on social media. . .. Dr. Kheriaty also serves in teaching...

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A Message from Tom DiLorenzo: Help Us in Our Fight to Save Freedom in America

Please help us in our fight to save freedom in America—and indeed the rest of the world—by making as generous a donation as you can. I became a student of Austrian economics and libertarian philosophy by accident. In my first semester in college in 1972, I signed up for Principles of Microeconomics. In the classroom was a bookshelf that happened to have all the back issues of The Freeman published by the Foundation for Economic Education. I started...

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