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The Situation Of Having To Belong To A State To Which One Does Not Wish Is No Less Onerous If It Is The Result Of An Election Than If One Must Endure It As The Consequence Of A Military Conquest.

-Ludwig Von Mises

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The Situation Of Having

Ludwig Von Mises

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The Situation Of Having To Belong To A State To Which One Does Not Wish Is No Less Onerous If It Is The Result Of An Election Than If One Must Endure It As The Consequence Of A Military Conquest.

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The Market Economy Needs No Apologists And Propagandists. It Can Apply To Itself The Words Of Sir Christopher Wren's Epitaph In St. Paul's: 'if You Seek His Monument, Look Around.'

Continued Inflation Inevitably Leads To Catastrophe.

What Governments Call International Monetary Cooperation Is Concerted Action For The Sake Of Credit Expansion.

Those Who Disagree With The Dictator's Plan Have No Other Means To Carry On Than To Defeat The Despot By Force Of Arms.

Socialism Is Not An Alternative To Capitalism; It Is An Alternative To Any System Under Which Men Can Live As Human Beings.

The History Of Mankind Is The History Of Ideas. For It Is Ideas, Theories, And Doctrines That Guide Human Action, Determine The Ultimate Ends Men Aim At, And The Choice Of The Means Employed For The Attainment Of These Ends.

As The Prosperity Of The Nation And The Height Of Wage Rates Depend On A Continual Increase In The Capital Invested In Its Plants, Mines And Farms, It Is One Of The Foremost Tasks Of Good Government To Remove All Obstacles That Hinder The Accumulation And Investment Of New Capital.

These People Talk Of A "middle-of-the-road" Policy. What They Do Not See Is That The Isolated Interference, Which Means The Interference With Only One Small Part Of The Economic System, Brings About A Situation Which The Government Itself — And The People Who Are Asking For Government Interference — Find Worse Than The Conditions They Wish To Abolish: The People Who Are Asking For Rent Control Are Very Angry When They Discover There Is A Shortage Of Apartments And A Shortage Of Housing.

If, As Is Generally The Case, The Heirs Are Not Equal To The Demands Which Life Makes On An Entrepreneur, The Inherited Wealth Rapidly Vanishes.

It Is Untrue That Some Are Poor Because Others Are Rich. If An Order Of Society In Which Incomes Were Equal Replaced The Capitalist Order, Everyone Would Become Poorer.

Men Are Fighting One Another Because They Are Convinced That The Extermination And Liquidation Of Adversaries Is The Only Means Of Promoting Their Own Well-being.

Socialism In Russia Has Not Brought About An Improvement In The Conditions Of The Average Man Which Can Be Compared With The Improvement Of Conditions, During The Same Period, In The United States.

The Situation Of Having To Belong To A State To Which One Does Not Wish Is No Less Onerous If It Is The Result Of An Election Than If One Must Endure It As The Consequence Of A Military Conquest.

It Is Evident That Youth Is The First Victim Of The Trend Toward Bureaucratization. The Young Men Are Deprived Of Any Opportunity To Shape Their Own Fate.

The Criterion Of Truth Is That It Works Even If Nobody Is Prepared To Acknowledge It.

The Boom Is Called Good Business, Prosperity, And Upswing. Its Unavoidable Aftermath, The Readjustment Of Conditions To The Real Data Of The Market, Is Called Crisis, Slump, Bad Business, Depression.

The Essential Characteristic Of Western Civilization That Distinguishes It From The Arrested And Petrified Civilizations Of The East Was And Is Its Concern For Freedom From The State.

Nobody Can Be At The Same Time A Correct Bureaucrat And An Innovator

A Higher Standard Of Living Also Brings About A Higher Standard Of Culture And Civilization.

The Santa Claus Principle Liquidates Itself.

The Main Achievement Of Economics Is That It Has Provided A Theory Of Peaceful Human Cooperation. This Is Why The Harbingers Of Violent Conflict Have Branded It As A Dismal Science And Why This Age Of Wars, Civil Wars, And Destruction Has No Use For It.

Against Nature And Within Nature There Is No Freedom.

The Market Steers The Capitalistic Economy. It Directs Each Individual's Activities Into Those Channels In Which He Best Serves The Wants Of His Fellow-men. The Market Alone Puts The Whole Social System Of Private Ownership Of The Means Of Production And Free Enterprise In Order And Provides It With Sense And Meaning.

Economics Must Not Be Relegated To Classrooms And Statistical Offices And Must Not Be Left To Esoteric Circles. It Is The Philosophy Of Human Life And Action And Concerns Everybody And Everything. It Is The Pith Of Civilization And Of Man's Human Existence.

Nothing Is More Calculated To Make A Demagogue Popular Than A Constantly Reiterated Demand For Heavy Taxes On The Rich. Capital Levies And High Income Taxes On The Larger Incomes Are Extraordinarily Popular With The Masses, Who Do Not Have To Pay Them.

Without Calculation, Economic Activity Is Impossible. Since Under Socialism Economic Calculation Is Impossible, Under Socialism There Can Be No Economic Activity In Our Sense Of The Word All Economic Change, Therefore, Would Involve Operations The Value Of Which Could Neither Be Predicted Beforehand Nor Ascertained After They Had Taken Place. Everything Would Be A Leap In The Dark. Socialism Is The Renunciation Of Rational Economy.

Private Property Creates For The Individual A Sphere In Which He Is Free Of The State. It Sets Limits To The Operation Of The Authoritarian Will.

In All Countries With A Settled Bureaucracy People Used To Say: The Cabinets Come And Go, But The Bureaus Remain.

Education Rears Disciples, Imitators, And Routinists, Not Pioneers Of New Ideas And Creative Geniuses. The Schools Are Not Nurseries Of Progress And Improvement, But Conservatories Of Tradition And Unvarying Modes Of Thought.

It Is Vain To Fight Totalitarianism By Adopting Totalitarian Methods. Freedom Can Only Be Won By Men Unconditionally Committed To The Principles Of Freedom. The First Requisite For A Better Social Order Is The Return To Unrestricted Freedom Of Thought And Speech.

The Capitalist System, In Spite Of All Obstacles Put In Its Way By Governments And Politicians, Has Raised The Standard Of Living Of The Masses In An Unprecedented Way.

The Interventionists Do Not Approach The Study Of Economic Matters With Scientific Disinterestedness. Most Of Them Are Driven By An Envious Resentment Against Those Whose Incomes Are Larger Than Their Own. This Bias Makes It Impossible For Them To See Things As They Really Are. For Them The Main Thing Is Not To Improve The Conditions Of The Masses, But To Harm The Entrepreneurs And Capitalists Even If This Policy Victimizes The Immense Majority Of The People.

In A Game There Are Winners And Losers. But A Business Deal Is Always Advantageous For Both Parties. If Both The Buyer And The Seller Were Not To Consider The Transaction As The Most Advantageous Action They Could Choose Under The Prevailing Conditions, They Would Not Enter Into The Deal.

If The Members Of Parliament No Longer Consider Themselves Mandatories Of The Taxpayers But Deputies Of Those Receiving Salaries, Wages, Subsidies, Doles, And Other Benefits From The Treasury, Democracy Is Done For.

What Workers Must Learn Is That The Only Reason Why Wage Rates Are Higher In The United States Is That The Per Head Quota Of Capital Invested Is Higher.

The Greater Productivity Of Work Under The Division Of Labor Is A Unifying Influence. It Leads Men To Regard Each Other As Comrades In A Joint Struggle For Welfare, Rather Than As Competitors In A Struggle For Existence. It Makes Friends Out Of Enemies, Peace Out Of War, Society Out Of Individuals.

Every Man Aims At Avoiding What Causes Him Pain; The Activities Of Government Ultimately Consist In The Infliction Of Pain. All Great Achievements Of Mankind Were The Product Of A Spontaneous Effort On The Part Of Individuals; Government Substitutes Coercion For Voluntary Action.

There Cannot Be Stable Money Within An Environment Dominated By Ideologies Hostile To The Preservation Of Economic Freedom.

Marx And Engels Openly Declared That The Progressive Income Tax And The Death Tax Are 'economically Untenable' And That They Advocated Them Only Because 'they Necessitate Further Inroads' Upon The Capitalist System And Are 'unavoidable' As A Means Of Bringing About Socialism.

Most Of Us Have No Sympathy With The Rich Idler Who Spends His Life In Pleasure Without Ever Doing Any Work. But Even He Fulfills A Function In The Life Of The Social Organism. He Sets An Example Of Luxury That Awakens In The Multitude A Consciousness Of New Needs And Gives Industry The Incentive To Fulfill Them.

All That Lenin Learned About Business From The Tales Of His Comrades Who Occasionally Sat In Business Offices Was That It Required A Lot Of Scribbling, Recording, And Ciphering. Thus, He Declares That Accounting And Control Are The Chief Things Necessary For The Organizing And Correct Functioning Of Society. . . . Here We Have The Philosophy Of The Filing Clerk In Its Full Glory.

Keynes Did Not Teach Us How To Perform The Miracle Of Turning A Stone Into Bread, But The Not At All Miraculous Procedure Of Eating The Seed Corn.

Spontaneous Actions Of Individuals, Aiming At Nothing Else Than At The Improvement Of Their Own State Of Satisfaction, Undermined The Prestige Of The Coercive Status System Step By Step.

The Illusiveness Of This Concept Of National Income Is To Be Seen In Its Dependence On Changes In The Purchasing Power Of The Monetary Unit. The More Inflation Progresses, The Higher Rises The National Income.

Where Nietzsche's Response To The Equation Of Socialism And Morality Was To Question The Value Of Morality, At Least As It Had Been Customarily Understood, Economists Like Mises And Hayek Pursued A Different Path, One Nietzsche Would Never Have Dared To Take: They Made The Market The Very Expression Of Morality.

The Government And Its Chiefs Do Not Have The Powers Of The Mythical Santa Claus. They Cannot Spend Except By Taking Out Of The Pockets Of Some People For The Benefit Of Others.

What Pays Under Capitalism Is Satisfying The Common Man, The Customer. The More People You Satisfy, The Better For You.

The Distinctive Principle Of Western Social Philosophy Is Individualism.

Everyone Carries A Part Of Society On His Shoulders; No One Is Relieved Of His Share Of Responsibility By Others. And No One Can Find A Safe Way Out For Himself If Society Is Sweeping Toward Destruction. Therefore, Everyone, In His Own Interests, Must Thrust Himself Vigorously Into The Intellectual Battle. None Can Stand Aside With Unconcern; The Interest Of Everyone Hangs On The Result. Whether He Chooses Or Not, Every Man Is Drawn Into The Great Historical Struggle, The Decisive Battle Into Which Our Epoch Has Plunged Us.

Liberalism Must Be Intolerant Of Every Sort Of Intolerance.

Everybody Thinks Of Economics Whether He Is Aware Of It Or Not. In Joining A Political Party Or In Casting His Ballot, The Citizen Implicitly Takes A Stand Upon Essential Economic Theories.

The Common Man Is The Sovereign Consumer Whose Buying Or Abstention From Buying Ultimately Determines What Should Be Produced And In What Quantity And Quality.

If The Practice Persists Of Covering Government Deficits With The Issue Of Notes, Then The Day Will Come Without Fail, Sooner Or Later, When The Monetary Systems Of Those Nations Pursuing This Course Will Break Down Completely. The Purchasing Power Of The Monetary Unit Will Decline More And More, Until Finally It Disappears Completely.

Disappear Completely

The Market System Is The Basis Of Our Civilization. Its Only Alternative Is The Führer Principle.

Every Government Intervention [in The Marketplace] Creates Unintended Consequences, Which Lead To Calls For Further Government Interventions.

Unintended Consequences

Depression Is The Aftermath Of Credit Expansion.

The Only Source From Which An Entrepreneurs Profits Stem Is His Ability To Anticipate Better Than Other People The Future Demand Of The Consumers.

True, Governments Can Reduce The Rate Of Interest In The Short Run. They Can Issue Additional Paper Money. They Can Open The Way To Credit Expansion By The Banks. They Can Thus Create An Artificial Boom And The Appearance Of Prosperity. But Such A Boom Is Bound To Collapse Soon Or Late And To Bring About A Depression.

There Is But One Means Available To Improve The Material Conditions Of Mankind: To Accelerate The Growth Of Capital Accumulated As Against The Growth In Population. The Greater The Amount Of Capital Invested Per Head Of The Worker, The More And Better Goods Can Be Produced And Consumed. This Is What Capitalism, The Much Abused Profit System, Has Brought About And Brings About Daily Anew. Yet, Most Present-day Governments And Political Parties Are Eager To Destroy This System.

If We Live Our Lives As A Gift It Is Possible To Reach A Blissful State Of Eternal Happiness. It Is Those Who Live Their Life With A Sense Of Entitlement That Undermine Peace , Freedom And Liberty. Know That Every Breath Is A Miracle And Every Moment A Blessing And You Will Achieve Your Dreams. Planning Other People's Actions Means To Prevent Them From Planning For Themselves, Means To Deprive Them Of Their Essentially Human Quality, Means Enslaving Them.

If History Could Prove And Teach Us Anything, It Would Be The Private Ownership Of The Means Of Production As A Necessary Requisite Of Civilization And Material Well-being. All Civilizations Have Up To Now Been Based On Private Property. Only Nations Committed To The Principle Of Private Property Have Risen Above Penury And Produced Science, Art, And Literature. There Is No Experience To Show That Any Other Social System Could Provide Mankind With Any Of The Achievements Of Civilization.

In Life Everything Is Continually In Flux.

He Who Only Wishes And Hopes Does Not Interfere Actively With The Course Of Events And With The Shaping Of His Own Destiny.

How Pale Is The Art Of Sorcerers, Witches, And Conjurors When Compared With That Of The Government's Treasury Department!

Inequality Of Wealth And Incomes Is An Essential Feature Of The Market Economy. It Is The Implement That Makes The Consumers Supreme In Giving Them The Power To Force All Those Engaged In Production To Comply With Their Orders. It Forces All Those Engaged In Production To The Utmost Exertion In The Service Of The Consumers. It Makes Competition Work. He Who Best Serves The Consumers Profits Most And Accumulates Riches.

The Planner Is A Potential Dictator Who Wants To Deprive All Other People Of The Power To Plan And Act According To Their Own Plans. He Aims At One Thing Only: The Exclusive Absolute Preeminence Of His Own Plan.

Socialism Is The Renunciation Of Rational Economy.

The Men Who Are To Protect The Community Against Violent Aggression Easily Turn Into The Most Dangerous Aggressors. They Transgress Their Mandate. They Misuse Their Power For The Oppression Of Those Whom They Were Expected To Defend Against Oppression. The Main Political Problem Is How To Prevent The Police Power From Becoming Tyrannical. This Is The Meaning Of All The Struggles For Liberty.

The Uncouth Hordes Of Common Men Are Not Fit To Recognize Duly The Merits Of Those Who Eclipse Their Own Wretchedness.

The Gold Standard Makes The Money's Purchasing Power Independent Of The Changing, Ambitions And Doctrines Of Political Parties And Pressure Groups. This Is Not A Defect Of The Gold Standard; It Is Its Main Excellence.

The Usual Terminology Of Political Language Is Stupid. What Is 'left' And What Is 'right'? Why Should Hitler Be 'right' And Stalin, His Temporary Friend, Be 'left'? Who Is 'reactionary' And Who Is 'progressive'? Reaction Against An Unwise Policy Is Not To Be Condemned. And Progress Towards Chaos Is Not To Be Commended.

Political Language

All People, However Fanatical They May Be In Their Zeal To Disparage And To Fight Capitalism, Implicitly Pay Homage To It By Passionately Clamoring For The Products It Turns Out

Socialism And Interventionism. Both Have In Common The Goal Of Subordinating The Individual Unconditionally To The State.

Freedom Really Means The Freedom To Make Mistakes.

Making Mistakes

Progress Is Precisely That Which Rules And Regulations Did Not Foresee.

Rules And Regulations

Nobody Is In A Position To Decree What Should Make A Fellow Man Happier.

If Men Do Not Now Succeed In Abolishing War, Civilization And Mankind Are Doomed.

Peace And Not War Is The Father Of All Things.

To Defeat The Aggressors Is Not Enough To Make Peace Durable. The Main Thing Is To Discard The Ideology That Generates War.

Only The Naive Inflationist's Could Believe That Government Could Enrich Mankind Through Fiat Money.

The Marxians Love Of Democratic Institutions Was A Stratagem Only, A Pious Fraud For The Deception Of The Masses. Within A Socialist Community There Is No Room Left For Freedom.

As Soon As We Surrender The Principle That The State Should Not Interfere In Any Questions Touching On The Individuals Mode Of Life, We End By Regulating And Restricting The Latter Down To The Smallest Details.

Under A Socialist Mode Of Production All Personal Incentives Which Selfishness Provides Under Capitalism Are Removed, And A Premium Is Put Upon Laziness And Negligence. Whereas In A Capitalist Society Selfishness Incites Everyone To The Utmost Diligence, In A Socialist Society It Makes For Inertia And Laxity.

Under Capitalism Everybody Is The Architect Of His Own Fortune.

Taxing Profits Is Tantamount To Taxing Success.

Government Is A Guarantor Of Liberty And Is Compatible With Liberty Only If Its Range Is Adequately Restricted To The Preservation Of What Is Called Economic Freedom.

Private Property Creates For The Individual A Sphere In Which He Is Free Of The State. It Sets Limits To The Operation Of The Authoritarian Will. It Allows Other Forces To Arise Side By Side With And In Opposition To Political Power. It Thus Becomes The Basis Of All Those Activities That Are Free From Violent Interference On The Part Of The State. It Is The Soil In Which The Seeds Of Freedom Are Nurtured And In Which The Autonomy Of The Individual And Ultimately All Intellectual And Material Progress Are Rooted.

The Better An Entrepreneur Succeeds, The More Is He Vilified And Themore Is He Soaked By Taxation.

He Who Acts Under An Emotional Impulse Also Acts. What Distinguishes An Emotional Action From Other Actions Is The Valuation Of Input And Output. Emotions Disarrange Valuations. Inflamed With Passion, Man Sees The Goal As More Desirable And The Price He Has To Pay For It As Less Burdensome Than He Would In Cool Deliberation.

He Who Is Unfit To Serve His Fellow Citizens Wants To Rule Them.

The State Can Be And Has Often Been In The Course Of History The Main Source Of Mischief And Disaster.

War Is Harmful, Not Only To The Conquered But To The Conqueror. Society Has Arisen Out Of The Works Of Peace; The Essence Of Society Is Peacemaking. Peace And Not War Is The Father Of All Things. Only Economic Action Has Created The Wealth Around Us; Labor, Not The Profession Of Arms, Brings Happiness. Peace Builds, War Destroys.

It Is Impossible To Describe Any Human Action If One Does Not Refer To The Meaning The Actor Sees In The Stimulus As Well As In The End His Response Is Aiming At.

When We Call A Capitalist Society A Consumers Democracy We Mean That The Power To Dispose Of The Means Of Production, Which Belongs To The Entrepreneurs And Capitalists, Can Only Be Acquired By Means Of The Consumers Ballot, Held Daily In The Marketplace.

The Direction Of All Economic Affairs Is In The Market Society A Task Of The Entrepreneurs. Theirs Is The Control Of Production. They Are At The Helm And Steer The Ship. A Superficial Observer Would Believe That They Are Supreme. But They Are Not. They Are Bound To Obey Unconditionally The Captain's Orders.

It Is Extremely Difficult For Our Contemporaries To Conceive Of The Conditions Of Free Banking Because They Take Government Interference With Banking For Granted And As Necessary.

If The Present American Laws Concerning The Taxation Of The Profits Of Corporations, The Incomes Of Individuals, And Inheritances Had Been Introduced About 60 Years Ago, All Those New Products Whose Consumption Has Raised The Standard Of Living Of The 'common Man' Would Either Not Be Produced At All Or Only In Small Quantities For The Benefit Of A Minority. The Ford Enterprises Would Not Exist If Henry Ford's Profits Had Been Taxed Away As Soon As They Came Into Being.

It Is Inherent In The Nature Of The Capitalistic Economy That, In The Final Analysis, The Employment Of The Factors Of Production Is Aimed Only Toward Serving The Wishes Of Consumers.

The Policies Advocated By The Welfare School Remove The Incentive To Saving On The Part Of Private Citizens.

The Causes Of All Panics, Crashes And Depressions Can Be Summed Up In Only Four Words: The Misuse Of Credit.

Only One Thing Can Conquer War-that Attitude Of Mind Which Can See Nothing In War But Destruction And Annihilation.

The Reichswirtschaftsministerium ('reich Ministry Of Economic Affairs') Tells The Shop Managers What And How To Produce, At What Prices And From Whom To Buy, At What Prices And To Whom To Sell. It Assigns Every Worker To His Job And Fixes His Wages. It Decrees To Whom And On What Terms The Capitalists Must Entrust Their Funds. Market Exchange Is Merely A Sham.

Capitalism Gave The World What It Needed, A Higher Standard Of Living For A Steadily Increasing Number Of People.

The Alcoholic And The Drug Addict Harm Only Themselves By Their Behavior; The Person Who Violates The Rules Of Morality Governing Mans Life In Society Harms Not Only Himself, But Everyone.

Manufacturing And Commercial Monopolies Owe Their Origin Not To A Tendency Imminent In A Capitalist Economy But To Governmental Interventionist Policy Directed Against Free Trade And Laissez Faire.

Capitalist Economy

Business Is A Means- The Only Means- To Increase The Quantity Of Goods Available For Preserving Life And Rendering It More Agreeable.

A Wealthy Man Can Preserve His Wealth Only By Continuing To Serve The Consumers In The Most Efficient Way.

There Is No Remedy For The Inefficiency Of Public Management.

The Only Means To Well-being Is To Increase The Quantity Of Products. This Is What Business Aims At.

Fascism Was An Emergency Makeshift. To View It As Something More Would Be A Fatal Error.

There Is An Inherent Tendency In All Governmental Power To Recognize No Restraints On Its Operation And To Extend The Sphere Of Its Dominion As Much As Possible. To Control Everything, To Leave No Room For Anything To Happen Of Its Own Accord Without The Interference Of The Authorities--th Is Is The Goal For Which Every Ruler Secretly Strives.

Only Stilted Pedants Can Conceive The Idea That There Are Absolute Norms To Tell What Is Beautiful And What Is Not. They Try To Derive From The Works Of The Past A Code Of Rules With Which, As They Fancy, The Writers And Artists Of The Future Should Comply. But The Genius Does Not Cooperate With The Pundit.

The Prevailing Legal And Moral Views Of A Time Are Held Not Only By Those Whom They Benefit But By Those, Too, Who Appear To Suffer From Them. Their Domination Is Expressed In That Fact- That The People From Whom They Claim Sacrifice Accept Them.

The Whole Of Mankind's Progress Has Had To Be Achieved Against The Resistance And Opposition Of The State And Its Power Of Coercion.

Society Is Only Possible On These Terms, That The Individual Finds Therein A Strengthening Of His Own Ego And His Own Will.

Man Is Not, Like The Animals, An Obsequious Puppet Of Instincts And Sensual Impulses. Man Has The Power To Suppress Instinctive Desires, He Has A Will Of His Own, He Chooses Between Incompatible Ends.

What Is Needed For A Sound Expansion Of Production Is Additional Capital Goods, Not Money Or Fiduciary Media. The Credit Expansion Is Built On The Sands Of Banknotes And Deposits. It Must Collapse.

As Society Is Only Possible If Everyone, While Living His Own Life, At The Same Time Helps Others To Live; If Every Individual Is Simultaneously Means And End; If Each Individual's Well-being Is Simultaneously The Condition Necessary To The Well-being Of Others, It Is Evident That The Contrast Between I And Thou, Means And End, Automatically Is Overcome.

A Short Time Ago The Demagogues Blamed Capitalism For The Poverty Of The Masses. Today They Rather Blame Capitalism For The "affluence" That It Bestows Upon The Common Man.

There Were Nowhere More Docile Disciples Of Lenin, Trotsky And Stalin Than The Nazis Were.

Scientific Research Sooner Or Later, But Inevitably, Encounters Something Ultimately Given That It Cannot Trace Back To Something Else Of Which It Would Appear As The Regular Or Necessary Derivative. Scientific Progress Consists In Pushing Further Back This Ultimately Given.

This, Then, Is Freedom In The External Life Of Man-that He Is Independent Of The Arbitrary Power Of His Fellows.

It Is Merely A Metaphor To Call Competition Competitive War, Or Simply, War. The Function Of Battle Is Destruction; Of Competition, Construction.

Within The Market Society Each Serves All His Fellow Citizens And Each Is Served By Them. It Is A System Of Mutual Exchange Of Services And Commodities, A Mutual Giving, And Receiving.

Economic Theory Has Demonstrated In An Irrefutable Way That A Prosperity Created By An Expansionist Monetary And Credit Policy Is Illusory And Must End In A Slump, An Economic Crisis.

Science Does Not Give Us Absolute And Final Certainty. It Only Gives Us Assurance Within The Limits Of Our Mental Abilities And The Prevailing State Of Scientific Thought.

Lenin's Ideal Was To Build A Nation's Production Effort According To The Model Of The Post Office.

It Is Solely Bigness In Business Which Makes It Possible To Supply The Masses With All Those Products The Present-day American Common Man Does Not Want To Do Without. Luxury Goods For The Few Can Be Produced In Small Shops. Luxury Goods For The Many Require Big Business.

The Comparatively Greater Prosperity Of The United States Is An Outcome Of The Fact That The New Deal Did Not Come In 1900 Or 1910, But Only In 1933.

The Recurrence Of Periods Of Depression And Mass Unemployment Has Discredited Capitalism In The Opinion Of Injudicious People. Yet These Events Are Not The Outcome Of The Operation Of The Free Market. They Are On The Contrary The Result Of Well-intentioned But Ill-advised Government Interference With The Market.

The Aim Of All Struggles For Liberty Is To Keep In Bounds The Armed Defenders Of Peace, The Governors And Their Constables. The Political Concept Of The Individual's Freedom Means: Freedom From Arbitrary Action On The Part Of The Police Power.

Innovators And Creative Geniuses Cannot Be Reared In Schools. They Are Precisely The Men Who Defy What The School Has Taught Them.

The Main Political Problem Is How To Prevent The Police Power From Becoming Tyrannical. This Is The Meaning Of All The Struggles For Liberty.

No Very Deep Knowledge Of Economics Is Usually Needed For Grasping The Immediate Effects Of A Measure; But The Task Of Economics Is To Foretell The Remoter Effects, And So To Allow Us To Avoid Such Acts As Attempt To Remedy A Present Ill By Sowing The Seeds Of A Much Greater Ill For The Future.

The Concept Of A 'just' Or 'fair' Price Is Devoid Of Any Scientific Meaning; It Is A Disguise For Wishes, A Striving For A State Of Affairs Different From Reality.

Liberty Is Always Freedom From The Government.

Reason Is The Main Resource Of Man In His Struggle For Survival.

Whether We Like It Or Not, It Is A Fact That Economics Cannot Remain An Esoteric Branch Of Knowledge Accessible Only To Small Groups Of Scholars And Specialists. Economics Deals With Society's Fundamental Problems; It Concerns Everyone And Belongs To All. It Is The Main And Proper Study Of Every Citizen.

The Salesman Thanks The Customer For Patronizing His Shop And Asks Him To Come Again. But The Socialists Say: Be Grateful To Hitler, Render Thanks To Stalin; Be Nice And Submissive, Then The Great Man Will Be Kind To You Later Too.

The Worst Law Is Better Than Bureaucratic Tyranny.

Two Hundred Years Ago, Before The Advent Of Capitalism, A Man's Social Status Was Fixed From The Beginning To The End Of His Life; He Inherited It From His Ancestors And It Never Changed.

A New Type Of Superstition Has Got Hold Of People's Minds, The Worship Of The State.

American Authors Or Scientists Are Prone To Consider The Wealthy Businessman As A Barbarian, As A Man Exclusively Intent Upon Making Money.

The Sharper The Competition, The Better It Serves Its Social Function To Improve Economic Production.

There Is No Kind Of Freedom And Liberty Other Than The Kind Which The Market Economy Brings About.

Capitalism And Socialism Are Two Distinct Patterns Of Social Organization. Private Control Of The Means Of Production And Public Control Are Contradictory Notions And Not Merely Contrary Notions. There Is No Such Thing As A Mixed Economy, A System That Would Stand Midway Between Capitalism And Socialism.

All Almsgiving Inevitably Tends To Pauperize The Recipient.

Socialist Society Is A Society Of Officials.

Monetary Calculation Is Not The Calculation, And Certainly Not The Measurement, Of Value. Its Basis Is The Comparison Of The More Important And The Less Important. It Is An Ordering According To Rank, An Act Of Grading (cuhel), And Not An Act Of Measuring. It Was A Mistake To Search For A Measure Of The Value Of Goods. In The Last Analysis, Economic Calculation Does Not Rest On The Measurement Of Values, But On Their Arrangement In An Order Of Rank.

Everything Brought Forward In Favor Of Socialism During The Last Hundred Years, In Thousands Of Writings And Speeches, All The Blood Which Has Been Spilt By The Supporters Of Socialism, Cannot Make Socialism Workable.

The Financial History Of The Last Century Shows A Steady Increase In The Amount Of Public Indebtedness. Nobody Believes That The States Will Eternally Drag The Burden Of These Interest Payments. It Is Obvious That Sooner Or Later All These Debts Will Be Liquidated In Some Way Or Other, But Certainly Not By Payment Of Interest And Principal According To The Terms Of The Contract.

Tyranny Is The Political Corollary Of Socialism, As Representative Government Is The Political Corollary Of The Market Economy.

You Have The Courage To Tell The Masses What No Politician Told Them: You Are Inferior And All The Improvements In Your Conditions Which You Simply Take For Granted You Owe To The Effort Of Men Who Are Better Than You. If This Be Arrogance, As Some Of Your Critics Observed, It Is Still The Truth That Had To Said In The Age Of The Welfare State.

We Must Fight All That We Dislike In Public Life. We Must Substitute Better Ideas For Wrong Ideas.

The Boom Squanders Through Malinvestment Scarce Factors Of Production And Reduces The Stock Available Through Overconsumption; Its Alleged Blessings Are Paid For By Impoverishment.

Overconsumption

Factors Of Production

Some Think That They Will Exercise Power For The General Good, But That Is What All Those With Power Have Believed. Power Is Evil In Itself, Regardless Of Who Exercises It.

Used To The Conditions Of A Capitalistic Environment, The Average American Takes It For Granted That Every Year Business Makes Something New And Better Accessible To Him. Looking Backward Upon The Years Of His Own Life, He Realizes That Many Implements That Were Totally Unknown In The Days Of His Youth And Many Others Which At That Time Could Be Enjoyed Only By A Small Minority Are Now Standard Equipment Of Almost Every Household.

A Country Becomes More Prosperous In Proportion To The Rise In The Invested Capital Unit Per Unit Of Its Population.

For It Is An Essential Difference Between Capitalist And Socialist Production That Under Capitalism Men Provide For Themselves, While Under Socialism They Are Provided For.

Library Of The Works Of Ludwig Von Mises”. Here Is An Article He Wrote In 1951, Some Two Years After His Magnum Opus Human Action Appeared, Where Is Lays Out His Case In A More Popular Form. The Money Sentences Are “economic Theory Has Demonstrated In An Irrefutable Way That A Prosperity Created By An Expansionist Monetary And Credit Policy Is Illusory And Must End In A Slump, An Economic Crisis. It Has Happened Again And Again In The Past, And It Will Happen In The Future, Too.

The Issue Is Always The Same: The Government Or The Market. There Is No Third Solution.

It Is Labor Alone That Is Productive: It Creates Wealth And Therewith Lays The Outward Foundations For The Inward Flowering Of Man.

The Most Successful Businessmen Were Often Uneducated When Measured By The Scholastic Standards Of The Teaching Profession. But They Were Equal To Their Social Function Of Adjusting Production To The Most Urgent Demand. Because Of These Merits The Consumers Chose Them For Business Leadership.

He Who Disdains The Fall In Infant Mortality And The Gradual Disappearance Of Famines And Plagues May Cast The First Stone Upon The Materialism Of The Economists.

Changes In Human Conditions Are Brought About By The Pioneering Of The Cleverest And Most Energetic Men. They Take The Lead And The Rest Of Mankind Follows Them Little By Little.

Human Condition

There Prevails On A Free Labor Market A Tendency Toward Full Employment.

The Body Of Economic Knowledge Is An Essential Element In The Structure Of Human Civilization; It Is The Foundation Upon Which Modern Industrialism And All The Moral, Intellectual, Technological, And Therapeutical Achievements Of The Last Centuries Have Been Built.

Capitalism Or Market Economy Is That System Of Social Cooperation And Division Of Labor That Is Based On Private Ownership Of The Means Of Production.

Division Of Labor

Against What Is Stupid, Nonsensical, Erroneous, And Evil, [classical] Liberalism Fights With The Weapons Of The Mind, And Not With Brute Force And Repression.

A Free Press Can Only Exist Where There Is Private Control Over The Means Of Production

The Market Economy Is The Social System Of The Division Of Labor Under Private Ownership Of The Means Of Production. Everybody Acts On His Own Behalf; But Everybodys Actions Aim At The Satisfaction Of Other Peoples Needs As Well As At The Satisfaction Of His Own. Everybody In Acting Serves His Fellow Citizens.

Division Of Labor

The Philosophy Underlying The System Of Progressive Taxation Is That The Income And Wealth Of The Well-to-do Classes Can Be Freely Tapped. What The Advocates Of These Tax Rates Fail To Realize Is That The Greater Part Of The Incomes Taxed Away Would Not Have Been Consumed But Saved And Invested.

Progressive Taxation

Welfare Policies Never Attain Those - Allegedly Beneficial - Ends Which The Government And The Self-styled Progressives Who Advocated Them Wanted To Attain, But - On The Contrary - Bring About A State Of Affairs Which - From The Very Point Of View Of The Government And Its Supporters - Is Even More Unsatisfactory Than The Previous State Of Affairs They Wanted To 'improve.'

Civilization Is A Work Of Peaceful Co-operation.

Government Spending Cannot Create Additional Jobs. If The Government Provides The Funds Required By Taxing The Citizens Or By Borrowing From The Public, It Abolishes On The One Hand As Many Jobs As It Creates On The Other.

No Architect Is Held Responsible For The Behavior Of Those Who Inhabit The Structure He Designed.

Modern Society, Based As It Is On The Division Of Labor, Can Be Preserved Only Under Conditions Of Lasting Peace.

Division Of Labor

No Increase In The Welfare Of The Member Of Society Can Result From The Availability Of An Additional Quantity Of Money.

The Government Pretends To Be Endowed With The Mystical Power To Accord Favors Out Of An Inexhaustible Horn Of Plenty. It Is Both Omniscient And Omnipotent. It Can By A Magic Wand Create Happiness And Abundance. The Truth Is The Government Cannot Give If It Does Not Take From Somebody.

Unemployment Doles Can Have No Other Effect Than The Perpetuation Of Unemployment.

Laissez Faire Does Not Mean: Let Soulless Mechanical Forces Operate. It Means: Let Individuals Choose How They Want To Cooperate In The Social Division Of Labor And Let Them Determine What The Entrepreneurs Should Produce.

Division Of Labor

Political Ideas That Have Dominated The Public Mind For Decades Cannot Be Refuted Through Rational Arguments. They Must Run Their Course In Life And Cannot Collapse Otherwise Than In Great Catastrophe.

An Intellectual Inferiority Of The Masses Would Manifest Itself Most Evidently In Their Aiming At The Abolition Of The System In Which They Themselves Are Supreme And Are Served By The Elite Of The Most Talented Men.

Only To Bureaucrats Can The Idea Occur That Establishing New Offices, Promulgating New Decrees, And Increasing The Number Of Government Employees Alone Can Be Described As Positive And Beneficial Measures.

If Some Peoples Pretend That History Or Geography Gives Them The Right To Subjugate Other Races, Nations, Or Peoples, There Can Be No Peace.

The Riches Of Successful Entrepreneurs Is Not The Cause Of Anybody's Poverty; It Is The Consequence Of The Fact That The Consumers Are Better Supplied Than They Would Have Been In The Absence Of The Entrepreneur's Efforts.

Resentment Is At Work When One So Hates Somebody For His More Favorable Circumstances That One Is Prepared To Bear Heavy Losses If Only The Hated One Might Also Come To Harm. Many Of Those Who Attack Capitalism Know Very Well That Their Situation Under Any Other Economic System Will Be Less Favorable.

If The Government Objects To Monopoly Prices For New Inventions, It Should Stop Granting Patents.

An Anti-something Movement Displays A Purely Negative Attitude. It Has No Chance Whatever To Succeed. Its Passionate Diatribes Virtually Advertise The Program They Attack. People Must Fight For Something That They Want To Achieve, Not Simply Reject An Evil, However Bad It May Be.

People Do Not Cooperate Under The Division Of Labor Because They Love Or Should Love One Another. They Cooperate Because This Best Serves Their Own Interests. Neither Love Nor Charity Nor Any Other Sympathetic Sentiments But Rightly Understood Selfishness Is What Originally Impelled Man To Adjust Himself To The Requirements Of Society, To Respect The Rights And Freedoms Of His Fellow Men And To Substitute Peaceful Collaboration For Enmity And Conflict.

Division Of Labor

The Capitalist System Was Termed "capitalism" Not By A Friend Of The System, But By An Individual Who Considered It To Be The Worst Of All Historical Systems, The Greatest Evil That Had Ever Befallen Mankind. That Man Was Karl Marx.

Do The American Voters Know That The Unprecedented Improvement In Their Standard Of Living That The Last Hundred Years Brought Was The Result Of The Steady Rise In The Per-head Quota Of Capital Invested? Do They Realize That Every Measure Leading To Capital Decumulation Jeopardizes Their Prosperity?

You Call It A 'loophole' When The Government Still Allows You Some Freedom.

This Is The Difference Between Slavery And Freedom. The Slave Must Do What His Superior Orders Him To Do, But The Free Citizen-and This Is What Freedom Means-is In A Position To Choose His Own Way Of Life.

The School Is A Political Prize Of The Highest Importance. It Cannot Be Deprived Of Its Political Character As Long As It Remains A Public And Compulsory Institution.

Economic Knowledge Necessarily Leads To Liberalism

In The World Of Reality, Life, And Human Action There Is No Such Thing As Interests Independent Of Ideas, Preceding Them Temporarily And Logically. What A Man Considers His Interest Is The Result Of His Ideas.

The Struggle For Freedom Is Not The Struggle Of The Many Against The Few, But Of Minorities, Sometimes Of A Minority Of But One Man Gainst The Majority.

Many Who Are Self-taught Far Excel The Doctors, Masters, And Bachelors Of The Most Renowned Universities.

A Citizen Who Casts His Ballot Without Having To The Best Of His Abilities Studied As Much Economics As He Can Fails In His Civic Duties.

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