There is more talk about another stimulus package to help save the economy. Word from Washington predicts that a package that includes extended unemployment benefits, food stamps, and another tax rebate check will pass in a forthcoming lame-duck session of Congress. All of these remedies actually make the patient sicker, but there is a way for
Unhinged 2.0 This article originally ran on Tuesday, February 17, 2009. It was near the low of the last stock-market cycle and the economy had endured a year of unprecedented government interventions. The Federal Reserve had made a series of bailouts, Detroit had been bailed out, and we had the various stimulus programs. These measures were sure
John Maynard Keynes often employed flowery language like “animal spirits” and “liquidity trap” to describe things he did not understand. He was, after all, more of a bureaucrat than an economist. In fact, he would best be described as an anti-economist because he eschewed things like supply and demand and held the opinion that government could run
Hollywood ain’t what it used to be. For the most part — and with known exceptions — the quality and content of today’s movies have plummeted when compared to the Golden Age. With the movies’ parade of sex and violence, they’re an easy target for cultural critics to say capitalism inflicts grave damage on the culture. Let’s take another look. It
[ Adapted from a classroom lecture delivered November 14, 2018 .] Scholars and scientists tell us that humanity is two or three hundred thousand years old, depending on how you define it. If you draw a graph with a horizontal line across a twenty-five-foot long wall to represent 250,000 years, then every foot would represent 10,000 years of human
Dr. Mark Thornton joined Glenn Beck for an interview on how Austrian economists have predicted every major crisis of the last century. The interview begins at the 44:50 mark. The Skyscraper Curse is available now as a hardback, paperback, e-book, and audiobook at the Mises Store. The book and audiobook are also available for free in the Mises
Mark Thornton joined our friend John O’Donnell at Power Trading Radio where they discussed 12 principles of Austrian economics, and how they compare to other schools of thought. Topics include trade, entrepreneurship, and prices.
Austerity: When It Works and When It Doesn’t by Alberto Alesina, Carlo Favero, and Francesco Giavazzi Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2019, xvi + 245 pp. Mark Thornton (mthornton@mises.org) is Senior Fellow at the Mises Institute and Book Review Editor at the QJAE. Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics 22, no. 1 (Spring 2019), for full
The High Cost of Good Intentions: A History of U.S. Federal Entitlement Programs John F. Cogan Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2017, 513 pp. Dr. Mark Thornton (mthornton@mises.org) is Senior Fellow at the Mises Institute and Book Review Editor of the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics. Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics 21, no. 4
The Free Market 14, no. 1 (January 1996) There is no oil in Nashville or sheep in St. Louis, and only the female Baltimore oriole is brown. But that hasn’t stopped the Rams from moving to Missouri, the Cleveland Browns from moving to Baltimore, or the Houston Oilers from moving to Nashville. Pigskin lovers and haters abound, but the ranks of
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The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.
