You would think that smart intellectuals would realize that no such animal as capitalism exists in the USA or anywhere else. In America we have a welfare state, a highly regulated, even regimented economy, which, admittedly, is relatively more free than the economies of other countries around the globe but by no means as free with respect to
The barriers to international trade continue to fall, and “globalization” is moving ahead. According to the World Trade Organization (WTO), the volume of trade is increasing at an annual rate of more than 6 percent, now exceeding $5 trillion. Some 60,000 “transnational” companies with more than 500,000 foreign affiliates are investing annually
Reading an individual’s balance of payments is very revealing. By comparing the income and the expenses of an individual, we can determine the position he or she occupies in economic life. The income ledger discloses not only the height of income but also its various sources. There may be labor income from services we render to our fellowmen, or
The Free Market 18, no. 2 (February 2000) The city of Seattle, which had planned to make money on hosting the World Trade Organization, wound up trying to cut its losses by asking the WTO to end its conference early and leave town. Self-described free-traders who helped to create the WTO ought to be feeling the same way. The organization that
The Free Market 18, no. 2 (February 2000) The left, most recently New York politico Lenora Fulani, likes to render the Boston Tea Party as a protest against corporate capitalism, and thereby analogous to the property-destroying protests at the World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle. A more traditional interpretation regards the Boston Tea
Miscalculating Human Interest Mises Review 6, No. 1 (Spring 2000) LUXURY FEVER: WHY MONEY FAILS TO SATISFY IN AN ERA OF EXCESS Robert H. Frank The Free Press, 1999, ix + 326 pgs. In 1958, John Kenneth Galbraith assailed American spending patterns. Consumers, he told us in The Affluent Society , spend too much on such fripperies as large tailfins
New Light on Socialism Mises Review 6, No. 2 (Summer 2000) POWER AND PROSPERITY: OUTGROWING COMMUNIST AND CAPITALIST DICTATORSHIPS Mancur Olson Basic Books, 2000, xxviix + 233 pgs. Mancur Olson’s new book resolves for me a major mystery. As all readers of The Mises Review know, socialism is an unworkable system. Mises conclusively demonstrated
The Free Market 18, no. 5 (May 2000) Until a few months ago, the sum of my experience with Latin America had been a few trips to border cities like Juarez, Nogales, and Tijuana. Beyond that, I had to depend upon Dan Rather, the New York Times, and various social activist groups to find out what was true about life South of the Border. All had a
The Free Market 18, no. 8 (August 2000) Francis Fukuyama, the famed author of The End of History , has tried his hand at political prognostication on the question of socialism. Writing in Time Magazine, he argues that full-blown socialism is dead for the foreseeable future. There will be no more attempts to fully collectivize the means of
Reviewing intellectual ideas is often hard work, involving slogging through numerous references and deep contemplation of the author’s contentions. That is why it is a true joy to occasionally come across work so egregiously chowder-headed that we can gleefully have at it without too much work at all. Just such work was brought to our attention
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.