Mold Society Anew?

Bob Higgs makes the point that the assault on liberty takes two forms - the extension or expansion of government powers. It is this ratchett effect the is the mechanism that diminishes our liberty.

This ratchett effect is celebrated by statists and, in an interesting book, I came across the following sentiment about WW I:

"For Dewey, the growing drumbeat for war seemed to present a glorious opportunity: mobilization he predicted, would shake up the status quo, expand state power, and give progressives the chance to mold society anew." (p 107 Gage).

All war is an opportunity to "expand the state" and the attitude expressed is disturbingly familiar, the expansion of the state is perceived in some way to be glorious. And what is glorious? The dictionary tells us that it is characterized by splendor; magnificent; delightful; wonderful. So, to the extent that the population finds expanded state power wonderful, the ratchett effect that leads to diminished liberty accelerates - for it is only a tenacious belief in liberty and individual freedom that keeps Leviathan at bay.

What is this glorious state power used for? It is used to "mold society anew". Terrifying words that evolve the Inquisition or the Holocaust and yet the wider population seems to find this wonderful and delightful prospect.

Thinking about the process of economic change, it seems to me that this fundamental change in thinking - state power is glorious rather than a ultimate evil - poses the greatest threat to future progress. This belief system will be far more pernicious than the looming deficits and debt, the health care "debate" or any other goofy scheme concocted by the republicans or democrats.

Amity Shlaes: The Forgotten Man

A great review

Mises Daily by C.J. Maloney | Posted on 9/3/2009 12:00:00 AM

So to me, while The Forgotten Man may occupy a place in the reviews as an economic history of the Great Depression — which it is up to a point — more than anything else it is a character study of the one man who above all defined and shaped the New Deal: Franklin Delano Roosevelt. And the book reads as a 383-page indictment of him.

Considering what we face today, this book is a must read, for example:

"With the possible exception of Al Capone's Chicago gang, 1930s America saw no greater pile of buccaneering stickup men and rogues than those with whom FDR surrounded himself. As one of the book's central themes, Amity Shlaes condemns them for introducing "regime uncertainty" into the economy, thereby exacerbating the Great Depression. Keep in mind that "regime uncertainty" is but a euphemism for "utter lawlessness."

This "regime uncertainty" was a direct result of the ideological underpinnings of FDR and his Brain Trust.

. . .

Throughout the book, Shlaes demonstrates that FDR considered the law not as something to be respected and adhered to, but as something to be cynically manipulated or ignored at leisure. In his hands, the law became a weapon to be used against his enemies and other, arbitrarily chosen targets. During his first year of rule alone, "10,000 pages of law had been created" (p. 202), and an army of bureaucrats and police had been raised to enforce them.

. . .

H.L. Mencken once observed that the great thing about democracy is that the people get what they deserve — good and hard. Mrs. Shlaes never lets the reader lose sight of the fact that while FDR ushered in the final destruction of the Republic, the American voters, for whatever reason, wanted FDR, loved the New Deal — and still do to this day.


. . .

And, like all socialist systems of government, everything quickly began to harden into an immovable inflexibility. Mrs. Shlaes tells us "the New Dealer's economic failures were working to their own political advantage" (p. 267). The massive increase in the size of the federal government allowed FDR to build himself a formidable political machine, so well-oiled by patronage jobs, bribes, and handouts that "millions of voters [were] under obligation to him" (p. 375), making an election defeat impossible.

As Mrs. Shlaes persuasively argues, the Great Depression did not end because of the New Deal. Quite the opposite, "the New Deal was causing the country to forgo prosperity, if not recovery" (p. 263). FDR and his New Deal became vampires, living high off a Great Depression that his policies were feeding and keeping alive.

Liberty: Liberty and Healthcare

Liberty: Liberty and Healthcare

Violence and Social Orders - Cambridge University Press

Violence and Social Orders - Cambridge University Press

A Neglected Masterpiece of Economic Analysis

Bob Higgs writes:

I recently read a book titled Banking and the Business Cycle: A Study of the Great Depression in the United States, by C. A. Phillips, T. F. McManus, and R. W. Nelson. It was originally published by Macmillan in March 1937, later became a hard-to-find, almost-forgotten book, and in 2007 was reissued by the Mises Institute in an inexpensive paperback edition.

I am willing to say that I know of no better book on the economic dynamics of the 1920s boom and early 1930s bust in the United States. I know about several other excellent books that every student of economics and economic history should read on the same topics, but if I could recommend only a single book to an aspiring economist, or even to an interested lay reader, this is the one I would recommend.

It is tempting to characterize its theoretical framework as Austrian, as indeed it is in many respects (Mises and Hayek are cited favorably, along with many other sound economists, many of them now forgotten), yet Phillips, McManus, and Nelson’s framework is broader and more eclectic than a strictly Austrian analysis would be. Moreover, besides being packed with excellent economic analysis in a great variety of applications, the book contains a wealth of quantitative evidence, which the authors handle with admirable caution and good sense. They present many tables and charts, but not a single equation. For modern mainstream economists, who can scarcely move a muscle without writing a raft of equations, this book stands as a brilliant reproach.

Read more here

Greg Ransom's Frosh reading list

10 Books For A Freshman Seminar In Economics

This post was written by Greg Ransom on August 31, 2009
Posted Under: Economics Profession

Here is Greg Mankiw’s list. Here is Arnold Kling’s list. And here is my list:

• The Rise of the Western World by Douglass North & Robert Paul Thomas

• Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy

• The Ascent of Money Niall Ferguson

• Discovery, Capitalism and Distributive Justice by Israel Kirzner

• A Farewell to Alms by Gregory Clark

• Dream Machines by Philip Mirowski

• Economics — Mathematical Politics or Science of Diminishing Returns? by Alexander Rosenberg

• Individualism and Economic Order by F. A. Hayek

• The Making of an Economist, Redux by David Colander

• The Elusive Quest for Growth by William Easterly

2009 Economic History Association Meetings