[Introduction to The Turgot Collection: Writings, Speeches, and Letters of Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, Baron de Laune (2011)] Anne Robert Jacques Turgot’s career in economics was brief but brilliant, and in every way remarkable. In the first place, he died rather young, and second, the time and energy he devoted to economics was comparatively
[This article was originally published in the Libertarian Forum , Vol. 10, No. 7, July 1977.] I have been ruminating recently on what are the crucial questions that divide libertarians. Some that have received a lot of attention in the last few years are: anarcho-capitalism vs. limited government, abolitionism vs. gradualism, natural rights vs.
[Excerpted from An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought , vol. 1, Economic Thought Before Adam Smith (1995). An MP3 audio file of this article, read by Jeff Riggenbach, is available for download .] One of the first Smithian economists, and, indeed, a man who was for two decades the only professor of political economy in England,
[This article is excerpted from Conceived in Liberty , volume 1, part 4, “The Rise and Fall of New Netherland,” chapter 39 “Governors and Government,” pp. 296–98; see “The Dutch West India Company,” pp. 288–91 and “The Algonquin War in New Netherland,” pp. 296–98 .] Peter Minuit was fired as director general by the Dutch West India Company in
[This article is excerpted from Conceived in Liberty , volume 1, part 4, “The Rise and Fall of New Netherland,” chapter 39 “Governors and Government,” pp. 296–98; see “The Dutch West India Company,” pp. 288–91 and “Dutch-Indian Relations Deteriorate,” pp. 291–96 .] The entire Algonquin peoples, led by the Haverstraws, rose up against their Dutch
As soon as he returned from war service [in World War I], Ludwig von Mises resumed his unpaid teaching duties at the university, adding an economics seminar in 1918. Mises writes that he only continued working at the Chamber because a paid university post was closed to him. Despite the fact that “I [did not] aspire to a position in government
[ In this chapter from Man, Economy, and State , Murray Rothbard explains how government employees consume productive resources, while both taxes and government spending distort the economy. ] For years, writers on public finance have been searching for the “neutral tax,” i.e., for that system of taxes which would keep the free market intact. The
Most economists are familiar with the controversy on the possibility of economic calculation under socialism, and with the fact that Ludwig von Mises and Oscar Lange were the two major protagonists of that debate. Many are also familiar with Lange’s ironic gibe that, for having posed the problem which Lange believed that socialism could readily
[ This originally appeared in Libertarian Review in November 1978 .] Libertarians surely favor freedom of speech, that is, the right to speak without being hampered by the government. But the right to speak implies the right not to speak, the right to remain silent. Yet libertarians have themselves been strangely silent on the many instances of
[ This originally appeared in Libertarian Review in November 1978 .] Libertarians surely favor freedom of speech, that is, the right to speak without being hampered by the government. But the right to speak implies the right not to speak, the right to remain silent. Yet libertarians have themselves been strangely silent on the many instances of
What is the Mises Institute?
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.
