[Excerpted from Defending the Undefendable .] At first glance it is not hard to answer the question, “Is blackmail really illegitimate?” The only problem it would seem to pose is, “Why is it being asked at all?” Do not blackmailers, well, blackmail people? And what could be worse? Blackmailers prey on people’s dark, hidden secrets. They threaten
George Reisman does not (fully) understand the libertarian view on free speech. In this otherwise excellent article of his George Reisman states: “Nevertheless, by the logic of the prevailing view of freedom of speech, protesters in the future will be able to storm into lecture halls and/or seize radio and television stations in order to deliver
The Creation of Jobs If the media tell us that “the opening of XYZ mill has created 1,000 new jobs,” we give a cheer. When the ABC company closes and 500 jobs are lost, we’re sad. The politician who can provide a subsidy to save ABC is almost assured of wide spread public support for his work in preserving jobs. But jobs in and of themselves do
If you’re reading this, you should be supporting the Mises Institute every month! I recently taught at the Mises University. This weekly experience is the highlight of my entire professional year, as it has been for lo these many decades. (When I started, I was an enfant terrible; now, I’m an old duffer. I don’t know what happened. Time goes by
The Free Market 25, no. 1 (January 2007) When I was about 18 years old I purchased my first bit of real estate. It was a four-family apartment house in the Sheepshead Bay neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, right near the ocean. I thought that one day it would become quite valuable. It was rent controlled and the rents were extremely low, so I
The Free Market 26, no. 10 (November 2008) Writing the introduction to Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt was a labor of love for me. You know how women sometimes say to each other “This dress is you!”? Well, this book is me! This was the first book on economics that just jumped out and grabbed me. I had read a few before, but they were
Volume 2, No. 3 (Fall 1999) This book is a thorough, lively, and almost encyclopedic defense of private-property rights. In this benighted age, there are not too many of those around. Ranging far and wide, Bethell shows the benefits of private property throughout history and in virtually every corner of the globe. He demonstrates how the
Volume 2, No. 4 (Winter 1999) We have tried to take Caplan to task for his many errors of omission and commission. Nevertheless, we think his was a very worthwhile article. Why? First, its quality. As a critique of Austrianism it far surpasses many of the others cited above, and is easily in the class of Nozick (1977), which we
Volume 3, No. 1 (Spring 2000) As I see matters, private-property rights are of crucial importance to civilization. They are what distinguishes us from the barbarians. To the extent we give in to the enemies of property rights, we reduce ourselves. Yet private property rights have always been under furious attack, and continue to be so.
Volume 3, No. 2 (Summer 2000) Both the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics and the Review of Austrian Economics are now publishing regularly and have been doing so ever since their respective inceptions. These periodicals have featured path breaking research from dozens of Austrians, and have managed to attract the contributions
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.
