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There Is Simply No Other Choice Than This: Either To Abstain From Interference In The Free Play Of The Market, Or To Delegate The Entire Management Of Production And Distribution To The Government. Either Capitalism Or Socialism: There Exists No Middle Way.

-Ludwig Von Mises

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There Is Simply No

Ludwig Von Mises

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There Is Simply No Other Choice Than This: Either To Abstain From Interference In The Free Play Of The Market, Or To Delegate The Entire Management Of Production And Distribution To The Government. Either Capitalism Or Socialism: There Exists No Middle Way.

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Credit Expansion Can Bring About A Temporary Boom. But Such A Fictitious Prosperity Must End In A General Depression Of Trade, A Slump.

Every Innovation Makes Its Appearance As A 'luxury' Of The Few Well-to-do. After Industry Has Become Aware Of It, The Luxury Then Becomes A 'necessity' For All.

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.

As The Liberal Sees It, The Task Of The State Consists Solely And Exclusively In Guaranteeing The Protection Of Life, Health, Liberty, And Private Property Against Violent Attacks. Everything That Goes Beyond This Is An Evil. A Government That, Instead Of Fulfilling Its Task, Sought To Go So Far As Actually To Infringe On Personal Security Of Life And Health, Freedom, And Property Would, Of Course, Be Altogether Bad.

A New Type Of Superstition Has Got Hold Of People's Minds, The Worship Of The State. People Demand The Exercise Of The Methods Of Coercion And Compulsion, Of Violence And Threat. Woe To Anybody Who Does Not Bend His Knee To The Fashionable Idols!

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.

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

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

Many Pioneers Of These Industrial Changes, It Is True, Became Rich. But They Acquired Their Wealth By Supplying The Public With Motor Cars, Airplanes, Radio Sets, Refrigerators, Moving And Talking Pictures, And Variety Of Less Spectacular But No Less Useful Innovations. These New Products Were Certainly Not An Achievement Of Offices And Bureaucrats.

The First Socialists Were The Intellectuals; They, And Not The Masses, Are The Backbone Of Socialism.

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.

All Those Evils Which The [liberals] Interpret As Evidence Of The Failure Of Capitalism, Are The Necessary Outcome Of Interference With The Market.

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.

The Characteristic Feature Of Capitalism That Distinguishes It From Pre-capitalist Methods Of Production Was Its New Principle Of Marketing. Capitalism Is Not Simply Mass Production, But Mass Production To Satisfy The Needs Of The Masses.

The Struggle For Freedom Is Ultimately Not Resistance To Autocrats Or Oligarchs But Resistance To The Despotism Of Public Opinion.

Economics Is Not About Things And Tangible Material Objects; It Is About Men, Their Meanings And Actions.

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.

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.

Spiritual Movements Are Revolts Of Thought Against Inertia, Of The Few Against The Many; Of Those Who Because They Are Strong In Spirit Are Strongest Alone Against Those Who Can Express Themselves Only In The Mass And The Mob, And Who Are Significant Only Because They Are Numerous.

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

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.

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

State Interference In Economic Life, Which Calls Itself Economic Policy, Has Done Nothing But Destroy Economic Life. Prohibitions And Regulations Have By Their General Obstructive Tendency Fostered The Growth Of The Spirit Of Wastefulness.

Once The Principle Is Admitted That It Is The Duty Of The Government To Protect The Individual Against His Own Foolishness, No Serious Objections Can Be Advanced Against Further Encroachments.

Perhaps There Are Somewhere In The Infinite Universe Beings Whose Minds Outrank Our Minds To The Same Extent As Our Minds Surpass Those Of The Insects. Perhaps There Will Once Somewhere Live Beings Who Will Look Upon Us With The Same Condescension As We Look Upon Amoebae.

What People Today Call Inflation Is Not Inflation, I.e., The Increase In The Quantity Of Money And Money Substitutes, But The General Rise In Commodity Prices And Wage Rates Which Is The Inevitable Consequence Of Inflation.

Commodity Prices

The Vigorous Man Industriously Striving For The Improvement Of His Condition Acts Neither More Nor Less Than The Lethargic Man Who Sluggishly Takes Things As They Come. For To Do Nothing And To Be Idle Are Also Action, They Too Determine The Course Of Events.

Anarchism Misunderstands The Real Nature Of Man. It Would Be Practicable Only In A World Of Angels And Saints

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

The Most Important Thing To Remember Is That Inflation Is Not An Act Of God, That Inflation Is Not A Catastrophe Of The Elements Or A Disease That Comes Like The Plague. Inflation Is A Policy.

Progress Of Any Kind Is Always At Variance With The Old And Established Ideas And Therefore With The Codes Inspired By Them. Every Step Of Progress Is A Change Involving Heavy Risks.

In Many Fields Of The Administration Of Interventionist Measures, Favoritism Simply Cannot Be Avoided.

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.

The Advocates Of Public Control Cannot Do Without Inflation. They Need It In Order To Finance Their Policy Of Reckless Spending And Of Lavishly Subsidizing And Bribing The Voters.

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.

There Is No Means Of Avoiding The Final Collapse Of A Boom Brought About By Credit Expansion. The Alternative Is Only Whether The Crisis Should Come Sooner As The Result Of Voluntary Abandonment Of Further Credit Expansion, Or Later As A Final And Total Catastrophe Of The Currency System Involved.

Economic Prosperity Is Not So Much A Material Problem; It Is, First Of All, An Intellectual, Spiritual, And Moral Problem.

The Masses Favor Socialism Because They Trust The Socialist Propaganda Of The Intellectuals. The Intellectuals, Not The Populace, Are Molding Public Opinion.

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

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.

In Life Everything Is Continually In Flux.

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.

Rulers Do Not Like To Admit That Their Power Is Restricted By Any Laws Other Than Those Of Physics And Biology. They Never Ascribe Their Failures And Frustrations To The Violation Of Economic Law.

The Mark Of The Creative Mind Is That It Defies A Part Of What It Has Learned.

It Is Not Conclusive Proof Of A Doctrine's Correctness That Its Adversaries Use The Police, The Hangman, And Violent Mobs To Fight It. But It Is A Proof Of The Fact That Those Taking Recourse To Violent Oppression Are In Their Subconscious Convinced Of The Untenability Of Their Own Doctrines.

The State Is Essentially An Apparatus Of Compulsion And Coercion. The Characteristic Feature Of Its Activities Is To Compel People Through The Application Or The Threat Of Force To Behave Otherwise Than They Would Like To Behave.

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.

Behaviorism Proposes To Study Human Behavior According To The Methods Developed By Animal And Infant Psychology. It Seeks To Investigate Reflexes And Instincts, Automatisms And Unconscious Reactions. But It Has Told Us Nothing About The Reflexes That Have Built Cathedrals, Railroads, And Fortresses, The Instincts That Have Produced Philosophies, Poems, And Legal Systems, The Automatisms That Have Resulted In The Growth And Decline Of Empires, The Unconscious Reactions That Are Splitting Atoms.

Capitalism Needs Neither Propaganda Nor Apostles. Its Achievements Speak For Themselves. Capitalism Delivers The Goods.

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

The Market Economy As Such Does Not Respect Political Frontiers. Its Field Is The World.

What Is Called Economic Progress Is The Joint Effect Of The Activities Of The Three Progressive Groups-or Classes-of The Savers, The Scientist-inventors, And The Entrepreneurs, Operating In A Market Economy As Far As It Is Not Sabotaged By The Endeavors Of The Nonprogressive Majority Of The Routinists And The Public Policies Supported By Them.

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.

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.'

Public Opinion Takes No Offense At The Endeavors Of Farmers, Workers, Clerks, Teachers, Doctors, Ministers, And People From Many Other Callings To Earn As Much As They Can. But It Censures The Capitalists And Entrepreneurs For Their Greed.

Historical Knowledge Is Indispensable For Those Who Want To Build A Better World

Historical Knowledge

Economic Control Is Not Merely Control Of A Sector Of Human Life That Can Be Separated From The Rest; It Is The Control Of The Means For All Our Ends.

To The Grumbler Who Complains About The Unfairness Of The Market System Only One Piece Of Advice Can Be Given: If You Want To Acquire Wealth, Then Try To Satisfy The Public By Offering Them Something That Is Cheaper Or Which They Like Better....equality Under The Law Gives You The Power To Challenge Every Millionaire.

Equality Under The Law

Those Who Satisfy The Wants Of A Smaller Number Of People Only Collect Fewer Votes-dollars-than Those Who Satisfy The Wants Of More People.

No One Should Expect That Any Logical Argument Or Any Experience Could Ever Shake The Almost Religious Fervor Of Those Who Believe In Salvation Through Spending And Credit Expansion.

Logical Arguments

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.

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.

In Relation To The Immense Sacrifices That The State Demands Of The Individual Through The Blood Tax, It Seems Rather Incidental Whether It Compensates The Soldier More Or Less Abundantly For The Loss Of Time That He Suffers From His Military-service Obligation.

There Is No Other Planning For Freedom And General Welfare Than To Let The Market System Work.

General Welfare

Despots And Democratic Majorities Are Drunk With Power.

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.

Freedom Is Indivisible. As Soon As One Starts To Restrict It, One Enters Upon A Decline On Which It Is Difficult To Stop.

In The Capitalist Society There Is A Place And Bread For All. Its Ability To Expand Provides Sustenance For Every Worker. Permanent Unemployment Is Not A Feature Of Free Capitalism.

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

A Lasting Order Cannot Be Established By Bayonets.

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.

The Bureaucrat Is Not Free To Aim At Improvement. He Is Bound To Obey Rules And Regulations Established By A Superior Body. He Has No Right To Embark Upon Innovations If His Superiors Do Not Approve Of Them. His Duty And His Virtue Is To Be Obedient.

Rules And Regulations

The Philosophy Commonly Called Individualism Is A Philosophy Of Social Cooperation And The Progressive Intensification Of The Social Nexus.

What Matters Is Not The Allocation Of Portions Out Of A Fund Presented To Man By Nature. The Problem Is Rather To Further Those Social Institutions Which Enable People To Continue And To Enlarge The Production Of All Those Things Which They Need.

The Main Characteristic Of Collectivism Is That It Does Not Take Notice Of The Individual's Will And Moral Self-determination. In The Light Of Its Philosophy The Individual Is Born Into A Collective And It Is "natural" And Proper For Him To Behave As Members Of This Collective Are Expected To Behave. Expected By Whom? Of Course, By Those Individuals To Whom, By The Mysterious Decrees Of Some Mysterious Agency, The Task Of Determining The Collective Will And Directing The Actions Of The Collective Has Been Entrusted.

The Worst Law Is Better Than Bureaucratic Tyranny.

Government Means Always Coercion And Compulsion And Is By Necessity The Opposite Of Liberty. Government Is A Guarantor Of Liberty And Is Compatible With Liberty Only If Its Range Is Adequately Restricted To The Preservation Of Economic Freedom. Where There Is No Market Economy, The Best-intentioned Provisions Of Constitutions And Laws Remain A Dead Letter.

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.

The Market And Its Inescapable Law Are Supreme.

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.

It Is Certain That Many Intellectuals Envy The Higher Income Of Prosperous Businessmen And That These Feelings Drive Them Toward Socialism. They Believe That The Authorities Of A Socialist Commonwealth Would Pay Them Higher Salaries Than Those That They Earn Under Capitalism.

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

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

The Foundation Of Any And Every Civilization, Including Our Own, Is Private Ownership Of The Means Of Production. Whoever Wishes To Criticize Modern Civilization, Therefore, Begins With Private Property.

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.

History Has Witnessed The Failure Of Many Endeavors To Impose Peace By War, Cooperation By Coercion, Unanimity By Slaughtering Dissidents.... A Lasting Order Cannot Be Established By Bayonets.

What Makes The Existence And The Evolution Of Society Possible Is Precisely The Fact That Peaceful Cooperation Under The Social Division Of Labor In The Long Run Best Serves The Selfish Concerns Of All Individuals. The Eminence Of The Market Society Is That Its Whole Functioning And Operation Is The Consummation Of This Principle.

Division Of Labor

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

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.

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.

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

The "progressives" Who Today Masquerade As "liberals" May Rant Against "fascism"; Yet It Is Their Policy That Paves The Way For Hitlerism. Nothing Could Have Been More Helpful To The Success Of The National-socialist (nazi) Movement Than The Methods Used By The "progressives," Denouncing Nazism As A Party Serving The Interests Of "capital." The German Workers Knew This Tactic Too Well To Be Deceived By It Again.

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.

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.

The Egalitarian Doctrine Is Manifestly Contrary To All The Facts Established By Biology And By History. Only Fanatical Partisans Of This Theory Can Contend That What Distinguishes The Genius From The Dullard Is Entirely The Effect Of Postnatal Influences.

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.

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.

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

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

Notwithstanding All The Passionate Fulminations Of The Spokesmen Of Governments, The Inevitable Consequences Of Inflationism And Expansionism...are Coming To Pass. And Then, Very Late Indeed, Even Simple People Will Discover That 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.

We Owe The Origin And Development Of Human Society And, Consequently, Of Culture And Civilization, To The Fact That Work Performed Under The Division Of Labor Is More Productive Than When Performed In Isolation.

Division Of Labor

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

It Is Impossible To Understand The History Of Economic Thought If One Does Not Pay Attention To The Fact That Economics As Such Is A Challenge To The Conceit Of Those In Power.

Government Is An Apparatus Of Compulsion And Coercion.

Progressive Taxation Of Income And Profits Means That Precisely Those Parts Of The Income Which People Would Have Saved And Invested Are Taxed Away

Progressive Taxation

Under The Gold Standard Gold Is Money And Money Is Gold. It Is Immaterial Whether Or Not The Laws Assign Legal Tender Quality Only To Gold Coins Minted By The Government.

During The 2300 Years Since Plato, Very Little Opposition Has Been Registered To His Ideas.

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

History Does Not Provide Any Example Of Capital Accumulation Brought About By A Government. As Far As Governments Invested In The Construction Of Roads, Railroads, And Other Useful Public Works, The Capital Needed Was Provided By The Savings Of Individual Citizens And Borrowed By The Government.

Socialism Is Not In The Least What It Pretends To Be. It Is Not The Pioneer Of A Better And Finer World, But The Spoiler Of What Thousands Of Years Of Civilization Have Created. It Does Not Build, It Destroys. For Destruction Is The Essence Of It. It Produces Nothing, It Only Consumes What The Social Order Based On Private Ownership In The Means Of Production Has Created.

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

Neither The Entrepreneurs Nor The Farmers Nor The Capitalists Determine What Has To Be Produced. The Consumers Do That.

Government Is Essentially The Negation Of Liberty.

The Methods Of The Natural Sciences Cannot Be Applied To Human Behavior Because This Behaviorlacks The Peculiarity That Characterizes Events In The Field Of The Natural Sciences, Viz., Regularity.

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

Free Markets. What Does This System Mean? The Answer Is Simple: It Is The Market Economy, It Is The System In Which The Cooperation Of Individuals In The Social Division Of Labor Is Achieved By The Market.

Division Of Labor

While Under Precapitalistic Conditions Superior Men Were The Masters On Whom The Masses Of The Inferior Had To Attend, Under Capitalism The More Gifted And More Able Have No Means To Profit From Their Superiority Other Than To Serve To The Best Of Their Abilities The Wishes Of The Majority Of The Less Gifted.

All This Talk: The State Should Do This Or That, Ultimately Means: The Police Should Force Consumers To Behave Otherwise Than They Would Behave Spontaneously.

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

If One Takes Pleasure In Calling The Gold Standard A "barbarous Relic," One Cannot Object To The Application Of The Same Term To Every Historically Determined Institution. Then The Fact That The British Speak English - And Not Danish, German, Or French - Is A Barbarous Relic Too, And Every Briton Who Opposes The Substitution Of Esperanto For English Is No Less Dogmatic And Orthodox Than Those Who Do Not Wax Rapturous About The Plans For A Managed Currency.

War Prosperity Is Like The Prosperity That An Earthquake Or A Plague Brings.

What Is Lacking To The Underdeveloped Nations Is Not Knowledge, But Capital.

Inflation Has Always Been An Important Resource Of Policies Of War And Revolution And Why We Also Find It In The Service Of Socialism.

Production Is Not Something Physical, Material, And External; It Is A Spiritual And Intellectual Phenomenon.

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.

Violent Resistance Against The Power Of The State Is The Last Resort Of The Minority In Its Effort To Break Loose From The Oppression Of The Majority. ... The Citizen Must Not Be So Narrowly Circumscribed In His Activities That, If He Thinks Differently From Those In Power, His Only Choice Is Either To Perish Or To Destroy The Machinery Of State.

Inflation Is The True Opium Of The People And It Is Administered To Them By Anticapitalist Governments And Parties.

Capitalism Has Improved The Standard Of Living Of The Wage Earners To An Unprecedented Extent. The Average American Family Enjoys Today Amenities Of Which, Only A Hundred Years Ago, Not Even The Richest Nabobs Dreamed.

Value Is Not Intrinsic, It Is Not In Things. It Is Within Us; It Is The Way In Which Man Reacts To The Conditions Of His Environment. Neither Is Value In Words And Doctrines, It Is Reflected In Human Conduct. It Is Not What A Man Or Groups Of Men Say About Value That Counts, But How They Act.

It Is Impossible To Grasp The Meaning Of The Idea Of Sound Money If One Does Not Realize That It Was Devised As An Instrument For The Protection Of Civil Liberties Against Despotic Inroads On The Part Of Governments.

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.

Continued Adherence To A Policy Of Compulsory Education Is Utterly Incompatible With Efforts To Establish Lasting Peace.

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

The Continued Existence Of Society Depends Upon Private Property.

Freedom And Liberty Always Mean Freedom From Police Interference.

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

War Prosperity Is Like The Prosperity That An Earthquake Or A Plague Brings...but No One Has For Those Reasons Yet Sought To Celebrate Earthquakes And Cholera As Stimulators Of The Productive Forces In The General Interest.

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

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.

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.

Daily Experience Proves Clearly To Everybody But The Most Bigoted Fanatics Of Socialism That Governmental Management Is Inefficient And Wasteful.

Once Public Opinion Is Convinced That The Increase In The Quantity Of Money Will Continue And Never Come To An End, And That Consequently The Prices Of All Commodities Will Not Cease To Rise, Everybody Becomes Eager To Buy As Much As Possible And Restrict His Cash Holdings To Minimum Size... If The Credit Expansion Is Not Stopped In Time, The Boom Turns To Crack-up Boom: The Flight Into Real Values Begins, And The Whole Monetary System Founders.

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?

A Famous, Very Often Quoted Phrase Says: "that Government Is Best, Which Governs Least." I Do Not Believe This To Be A Correct Description Of Of The Functions Of A Good Government. Government Ought To Do All The Things For Which It Is Needed And For Which It Is Established. Government Ought To Protect The Individuals Within The Country Against The Violent And Fraudulent Attacks Of Gangsters, And It Should Defend The Country Against Foreign Enemies. These Are The Functions Of Government Within A Free System, Within The System Of The Market Economy.

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.

Peace And Not War Is The Father Of All Things.

History Can Tell Us What Happened In The Past. But It Cannot Assert That It Must Happen Again In The Future.

The Riches Of The Rich Are Not The Cause Of The Poverty Of Anybody; The Process That Makes Some People Rich Is, On The Contrary, The Corollary Of The Process That Improves Many Peoples Want Satisfaction. The Entrepreneurs, The Capitalists And The Technologists Prosper As Far As They Succeed In Best Supplying The Consumers.

Action Is An Attempt To Substitute A More Satisfactory State Of Affairs For A Less Satisfactory One. We Call Such A Willfully Induced Alteration An Exchange.

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.

Liberalism Must Be Intolerant Of Every Sort Of Intolerance.

The Market Economy-capitalism-is A Social System Of Consumers' Supremacy.

Is Still Fulfilling Its Social Function In Supplying The Consumers With More, Better And Cheaper Goods.

The Law-abiding Citizen By His Labor Serves Both Himself And His Fellow Man And Thereby Integrates Himself Peacefully Into The Social Order. The Robber, On The Other Hand, Is Intent, Not On Honest Toil, But On The Forcible Appropriation Of The Fruits Of Others' Labor.

A Society That Chooses Between Capitalism And Socialism Does Not Choose Between Two Social Systems; It Chooses Between Social Cooperation And The Disintegration Of Society. Socialism Is Not An Alternative To Capitalism; It Is An Alternative To Any System Under Which Men Can Live As Human Beings.

Scientific Criticism Has No Nobler Task Than To Shatter False Beliefs.

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.

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.

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

All Present-day Governments Are Fanatically Committed To An Easy Money Policy.

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

Liberty Is Meaningless If It Is Only The Liberty To Agree With Those In Power.

The Productivity Of Social Cooperation Surpasses In Every Respect The Sum Total Of The Production Of Isolated Individuals.

The Market Is A Democracy In Which Every Penny Gives A Right To Vote.

Inflationism, However, Is Not An Isolated Phenomenon. It Is Only One Piece In The Total Framework Of Politico-economic And Socio-philosophical Ideas Of Our Time. Just As The Sound Money Policy Of Gold Standard Advocates Went Hand In Hand With Liberalism, Free Trade, Capitalism And Peace, So Is Inflationism Part And Parcel Of Imperialism, Militarism, Protectionism, Statism And Socialism.

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

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

Depression Is The Aftermath Of Credit Expansion.

Where There Is No Market Economy, The Best Intentioned Provisions Of Constitutions And Laws Remain A Dead Letter.

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

Society Is Joint Action And Cooperation In Which Each Participant Sees The Other Partner's Success As A Means For The Attainment Of His Own.

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 Goal Of Liberalism Is The Peaceful Cooperation Of All Men. It Aims At Peace Among Nations Too. When There Is Private Ownership Of The Means Of Production Everywhere And When Laws, The Tribunals And The Administration Treat Foreigners And Citizens On Equal Terms, It Is Of Little Importance Where A Country's Frontiers Are Drawn... War No Longer Pays; There Is No Motive For Aggression... All Nations Can Coexist Peacefully.

In Talking About Equality And Asking Vehemently For Its Realization, Nobody Advocates A Curtailment Of His Own Present Income.

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.

The Inequality Of Income And Fortunes Is Essential In Capitalism.

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.

Government Is The Only Institution That Can Take A Valuable Commodity Like Paper, And Make It Worthless By Applying Ink.

The Interventionist Policy (big Government) Provides Thousands And Thousands Of People With Safe, Placid, And Not Too Strenuous Jobs At The Expense Of The Rest Of Society.

Man Is Born An Asocial And Antisocial Being. The Newborn Child Is A Savage. Egoism Is His Nature. Only The Experience Of Life And The Teachings Of His Parents, His Brothers, Sisters, Playmates, And Later Of Other People Force Him To Acknowledge The Advantages Of Social Cooperation And Accordingly To Change His Behavior.

The Market Is Not A Place, A Thing, Or A Collective Entity. The Market Is A Process, Actuated By The Interplay Of The Actions Of The Various Individuals Cooperating Under The Division Of Labor.

The Program Of Liberalism If Condensed Into A Single Word, Would Have To Read: Property, That Is, Private Ownership Of The Means Of Production.

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

The Real Bosses, In The Capitalist System Of Market Economy, Are The Consumers.

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.

Whoever Prefers Life To Death, Happiness To Suffering, Well-being To Misery Must Defend Without Compromise Private Ownership In The Means Of Production.

Action Based On Reason, Action Therefore Which Is Only To Be Understood By Reason, Knows Only One End, The Greatest Pleasure Of The Acting Individual.

Some Experts Have Declared That It Is Necessary To Tax The People Until It Hurts. I Disagree With These Sadists.

He Who Serves The Public Best, Makes The Highest Profits.

Reason's Biological Function Is To Preserve And Promote Life And To Postpone Its Extinction As Long As Possible. Thinking And Acting Are Not Contrary To Nature; They Are, Rather, The Foremost Features Of Man's Nature. The Most Appropriate Description Of Man As Differentiated From Nonhuman Beings Is: A Being Purposively Struggling Against The Forces Adverse To His Life.

In The Bureaucratic Machine Of Socialism The Way Toward Promotion Is Not Achievement But The Favor Of The Superiors.

There Is No Remedy For The Inefficiency Of Public Management.

The Masses, In Their Capacity As Consumers, Ultimately Determine Everybody's Revenues And Wealth.

A Nation, Therefore, Has No Right To Say To A Province: You Belong To Me, I Want To Take You. A Province Consists Of Its Inhabitants. If Anybody Has A Right To Be Heard In This Case It Is These Inhabitants. Boundary Disputes Should Be Settled By Plebiscite.

What Pushes The Masses Into The Camp Of Socialism Is, Even More Than The Illusion That Socialism Will Make Them Richer, The Expectation That It Will Curb All Those Who Are Better Than They Themselves Are.

Every Socialist Is A Disguised Dictator.

All Almsgiving Inevitably Tends To Pauperize The Recipient.

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.

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

Public Works Are Not Accomplished By The Miraculous Power Of A Magic Wand. They Are Paid For By Funds Taken Away From The Citizens.

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