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I recently spent five days in Lancaster, NH, home of the annual Porcupine Freedom Festival , or “PorcFest.” Although PorcFest may not be for everyone, libertarians — especially younger ones — who have never attended should definitely consider adding it to their summer vacation plans. Libertarians Just Wanna Have Fun I’m a workaholic, and I also

Ron Paul recently made (another) splash among economic pundits with his suggestion that the Treasury simply cancel the $1.6 trillion in its debt held by the Federal Reserve. Many of Paul’s longstanding critics seized on the proposal as reckless and said it was further evidence that Paul doesn’t understand financial markets. However, Paul received

The last-minute negotiations over the debt ceiling have brought the economic pundits out in force. In the midst of a terrible recession, the contrast between Austrian and Keynesian analysis is striking. The Austrians recommend the virtues of saving and investment, while Keynesians preach the opposite. Things are so topsy-turvy that in this

As part of my Mises Academy class Keynes, Krugman, and the Crisis , I have reread large portions of The General Theory . In his masterpiece, Keynes erects an impressive framework on one crucial assumption: left to its own devices, the free market can get stuck in an equilibrium with very high unemployment. Although Keynes’s whole edifice and

This week Nelson Mandela celebrates his 93rd birthday. In honor of the event, the Nelson Mandela Foundation is asking people to donate 67 minutes of their time to public service. Although the foundation and the media reporting on it undoubtedly mean well, the entire discussion perpetuates the myth that paid work is somehow useless to society. But

Large, densely populated urban areas put economic principles in a pressure cooker, as it were. The extremes of urban life make things evident that would not be as obvious in a small town. With the right combination of entrepreneurial drive and the rule of law, metropolitan areas are economic powerhouses. The Division of Labor Ludwig von Mises

I have recently completed a study guide to Ludwig von Mises’s classic work, The Theory of Money and Credit . (The PDF of the guide is available right now, and the physical book should be ready soon.) In The Theory of Money and Credit , Mises integrated (what we now call) microeconomics and macroeconomics. He used subjective marginal utility theory

My local grocery store has an affiliated gas station that offers ten cents off per gallon for every $100 spent on groceries. I provoked a discussion on Facebook by asking whether I should use my accumulated points every time I fill up the tank, or whether it makes more sense to only use the option periodically in order to get a bigger discount. We

Now that the “crisis” over the federal debt ceiling has been averted, we can leisurely explore two of the wackier proposals that emerged during the state of panic. Not surprisingly, the schemes involved the Federal Reserve and its ability to circumvent, not just standard accounting, but also the traditional divisions of political power. It’s worth

Investors the world over are still reeling from last Thursday’s massive plunge in the US equity markets, in which the major indices all gave up more than 4 percent. It was the worst day for the US stock market since December 2008. None of this should surprise those conversant with Austrian economics. The “fundamentals” of the economy have been and