A trope of contemporary social commentary is that “science” has somehow become “politicized,” such that people no longer trust or believe what is presented as the scientific consensus on important social, political, and economic issues. The most salient example until recently was climate change, where various scientific professionals,
I can’t recall the last time I heard something on National Public Radio in defense of savings but, there it was, in this morning’s Marketplace segment on Karen Petrou’s new book Engine of Inequality: The Fed and the Future of Wealth in America . Savings, Petrou asserts, are the “engine of wealth accumulation.” Petrou, whose work has been discussed
I met Murray in 1988 and I will never forget the experience. The story begins the previous year, as I was completing my bachelor’s degree in economics at the University of North Carolina and considering pursuing a PhD. I was familiar with Murray’s writings as a semicloseted Austrian in a mainstream economics program. I had seen an advertisement
As with the federal investigation into college basketball recruiting, the college admissions scandal announced yesterday seems to fall into FBI jurisdiction only because of the overly broad mail and wire fraud statutes and federal racketeering laws — which make every tort or contract violation into a federal crime. Put differently, if rich parents
Before Kitchen Confidential made him a celebrity, Anthony Bourdain was a real chef, working upscale New York kitchens at places like the Supper Club and Sullivan’s. Bourdain’s style is not to everyone’s taste, but he knows how to manage a restaurant crew. A chef, after all, is not primarily an artist, but a manager, facing the same set of
Civil libertarians: a wholly unaccountable government agency records 100% of your electronic communications. Americans: *yawn* Media: a private firm, accountable to its board, shareholders, and customers, has been sharing some information you gave it. Americans: *meltdown* From Peter Klein’s Twitter
Nicolai Foss and I have written a paper criticizing currently fashionable “stakeholder” approaches to the firm and the idea that managers should pursue “corporate social responsibility.” BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, who manages $6 trillion in corporate assets, made a splash last month by insisting that corporate executives focus not on shareholders,
“Could Bill Belichick’s grasp of economics be the key to the Patriots’ success?” asks Paul Solman at PBS’s Making Sen$e . He gives examples of Belichick seemingly understanding the concepts of opportunity cost and diminishing returns (from the perspective of neoclassical economics). I much prefer Carl Menger’s way of formulating these concepts
Following the Parkland school shooting we’re again hearing about the “epidemic” of “gun violence” and how to stop it. I wrote a piece in 2016 about how this is exactly the wrong metaphor for school shootings or any other kind of violent action. I dislike the term “gun violence” because it depersonalizes a shooting. If person A robs person B, we
In a recent social media discussion someone raised the issue of Murray Rothbard’s relationship with Milton Friedman. I reported that Rothbard had a good relationship with Friedman and other academic libertarians in the 1950s and early 1960s, with Friedman even recommending Rothbard for a post at Chicago. Thanks to the Mises Insittute’s archivist
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.