The Future of Austrian Economics | Murray N. Rothbard

This is the famous speech by Murray Rothbard given in the days following the collapse of the Soviet empire. His exuberance is palpable has he explains the meaning of it all for the place of liberty in the history of civilization.
A brilliant scholar and passionate defender of Liberty, Professor Murray Rothbard (1926-1995) was dean of the Austrian School of economics, holder of the S.J. Hall Chair at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and Academic Vice President of the Ludwig von Mises Institute.

The author of 17 books and thousands of articles, the foremost Misesian economist, the father of modern freedom theory, and the most delightful personality in the profession, this great teacher here spellbinds an audience of students, faculty, and business leaders in the "Future of Austrian Economics," at the 1990 Mises University at Stanford.

Only Austrian economics, Rothbard shows, can explain the collapse of socialism/communism and tell us what should replace it: laissez-faire capitalism. There is a lesson here as well, he shows, for dealing with the Leviathan in Washington, D.C.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Austrian
• economics
• rothbard
• mises
• freedom
• liberty
• anarchy
• libertarian

[bobsacamano1]

My city library, the Columbus Metropolitan Library in Columbus Ohio has several hundred copies of Sarah Palin books and a single copy of one book by Murray Rothbard. What is wrong with this?

[BIackOp]

As usual it goes right over your head, bellcord. 

[casualdissent]

@zsylvana Look at this midget, just pasting walls of text from random books because he can't argue for himself...

[tubo222555]

@zsylvana

Then explain why we continue to have both high inflation and high unemployment?

[tubo222555]

@zsylvana

Inflation and unemployment are not negatively correlated, as stagflation proved as does the current bout of inflation and unemployment at the same time. Decreasing the deficit will not cause increased unemployment.

[tubo222555]

@zsylvana

Americans are in debt, and the government is in greater debt. We are spending more than we take in. That is called living beyond our means.

[tubo222555]

@zsylvana

Inflation is the expansion of the money supply. Rising prices and inflation are not the same thing. Rising prices across the economy is a result of inflation (the creation of more money). If certain goods become more expensive, other goods must also become cheaper, for the same amount of money exists. Only the creation of new money can result in rising prices overall.

[zsylvana]

@onepiecefan74 6) Inflation occurs when sellers raise prices; they can do this profitably when the forces of competition are weakened by the differentiation of products,misleading advertising,obfuscating sales gimmicks,package deals, mergers takeovers,increasing importance of ancillary services,trade secrets,patents,copyrights, overheads, and start-up costs.nflation does occur in the midst of underutilized resources,and need not occur even if we consuming more than we produce.

[zsylvana]

@onepiecefan74 5) Inflation is a not reflection of "living beyond our means." The only time we could be said to have been really living beyond our means was in war-time when capital was being destroyed and undermaintained. We have not lived even up to our means in peace-time since 1926, when it is now estimated that unemployment according to today's definition went down to around 1.5%. This level has not been approached since,except at the height of World War II

[zsylvana]

@onepiecefan74 4) The answer is not to decrease the nominal deficit to check inflation by increased unemployment, but rather to increase the nominal deficit to maintain the real deficit, controlling inflation, if necessary, by direct means that do not involve increased unemployment.

[zsylvana]

@onepiecefan74 3)The main difficulty with inflation,is not with the effects of inflation itself,but the unemployment produced by inappropriate attempts to control the inflation.Unanticipated acceleration of inflation can reduce the real deficit relative to the nominal deficit by reducing the real value of the long-term debt.Policy of limiting the nominal budget deficit is persisted in,this is likely to result in continued excessive unemployment due to reduction in effective demand