What the New Nobel Winners Get Wrong about Economics

Frank Shostak

This year’s Nobel Prize in economics was awarded to David Card of the University of California, Berkeley, Joshua Angrist of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Guido Imbens of Stanford University. The laureates, according to the Nobel Committee have made an important contribution as to how to ascertain cause and effect from observational data.

Why Businessmen Make Such Unimpressive Politicians

Connor Mortell

In 2016, we watched time and time again as polls stated that people liked Donald Trump because he is a businessman and came from outside the world of politics. Dozens of factors led to his election but there is no doubt that among voters this mindset of the potential for a savvy businessman in charge was at play. However, looking at it in hindsight, can we really say that a savvy businessman was ever in charge? Perhaps the most successful libertarian there has ever been, the great Dr. Ron Paul, wrote explaining that when it comes to spending the argument was always “Trump vs. Trump.” He’d speak seeking to cut taxes and then would ask for raises on spending and print money to close the gap. Dr. Paul goes as far as to say, “Following the President’s constantly changing policies can make you dizzy.” So why is it that this businessman would come into office and then act in direct opposition to the business-oriented nature he claimed he’d demonstrate? The easy answer would be that it turned out that he was never really a good businessman to begin with. There may or may not be merit to this argument. But it does not matter whether or not he was a competent businessman, because the minute he took his oath of office, he became part of a bureaucracy and any expectations of fiscal or monetary responsibility were immediately lost. This is because it is impossible to run a government “like a business.” There’s no economic calculation and no way of measuring profit.

How the “Respectable” Media Serves the Political Elite

Murray N. Rothbard

[Editor’s note: Two interviews from August 1992 given by Murray Rothbard to the Swedish student publication Svensk Linje (continuously published since 1942) were recently discovered in the Rothbard Archives and translated by Sven Thommesen for the first time. In this interview, Rothbard offers his thoughts on the 1992 election and the role of the “respectable” media in promoting the campaign of Bill Clinton.]

“The Great Reset” Is the Road to Socialism Mises Warned Us About

Tho Bishop

Through the sheer power of his intellectual output, Ludwig von Mises established himself as one of the most important intellectuals of the twentieth century. His work Human Action remains a foundational text of the Austrian school. His critique outlining the impracticality of socialism was vindicated with the fall of the Soviet Union and remains without a serious intellectual challenge today.

Inflation Is Killing the Recovery

Daniel Lacalle

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

Last week, Ned Davis Research published a note titled “Turns Out, Growth Looks like It Was Transitory—Inflation Is More Sticky.” There are many factors that show us that consumers and salaries are being eaten away by inflation, leading to an abrupt halt in the recovery. Autos and new home sales plunged, real disposable personal income has plummeted, and real median wage growth is lower than inflation.

A Global Fiat Currency: “One Ring to Rule Them All”

Thorsten Polleit

1.

Human history can be viewed from many angles. One of them is to see it as a struggle for power and domination, as a struggle for freedom and against oppression, as a struggle of good against evil.

Before a Bust, There Is Always a Boom (and Malinvestment)

Frank Shostak

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

For most commentators lending is associated with money. However, is this the case? When a saver lends money, what he/she in fact lends to a borrower is final consumer goods that he/she did not consume. Therefore, what a lender lends to a borrower is savings and not money as such. 

Why the Fed Is So Desperate to Hide Price Inflation

Thorsten Polleit

Speaking at the Jackson Hole meeting on August 27, 2021, Federal Reserve (Fed) chairman Jerome J. Powell indicated that he supported “tapering” toward the end of this year and hastened to add that interest rate hikes are still a long way off. The term “tapering” means that the central bank reduces its monthly purchases of bonds and slows down the monthly increase in the quantity of money accordingly. In other words, even with tapering, the Fed will still churn out newly printed US dollar balances, but to a lesser extent than before; that is, it will still cause monetary inflation, but less than before. 

Remember When Conservatives “Canceled” Anyone against the War on Terror? I Do.

James Bovard

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

Life in American changed twenty years ago after the 9/11 attacks. Many Americans became enraged at anyone who did not swear allegiance to President George W. Bush’s anti terrorism crusade. Anyone who denied “they hate us for our freedoms” automatically became an enemy of freedom.

Can Taxation Be Justified?

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

David Gordon

The philosopher Michael Huemer is usually favorable to the free market, and he is also a strong defender of anarchism. Although I disagree with some of the arguments in his defense of anarchism, The Problem of Political Authority, it is an excellent book.

Recession and Recovery: W.H. Hutt’s View

Robert Blumen

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

There is a considerable Austrian literature on the unsustainable boom driven by credit expansion. When the boom ends, a depression begins. The depression is a transitional period of reduced production that lasts until entrepreneurs restructure capital and labor into sustainable uses. During the depression, there is unavoidable unemployment of both people and productive assets. The recovery is marked by an increase in production and the employment of resources that were idle during the bust.

Low Interest Rates, Weak Growth

Daniel Lacalle

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

Central banks should know by now that you cannot have negative interest rates with low bond yields and strong growth. One or the other.

Central banks have chosen low bond yields at any cost, despite all the evidence of stagnation ahead. This creates enormous problems

It is not a surprise that markets have bounced aggressively, driven by the tech sector, after a slump based on concerns about the pace of economic growth. Stimulus package effects are increasingly short, and this was pretty evident in the poor figures of industrial production and the ZEW survey gauge of expectations. The same can be said about a weakening ISM index in the United States. United States ISM Services PMI came in at 60.1, below expectations (63.5) in June, precisely in the sector where the recovery should be strongest.

Interestingly, European markets declined sharply after the European Central Bank sent the ultimate dovish message, a change in its inflation target that would allow the central bank to exceed its 2 percent limit without change of policy. What does it all tell us?

First, that the placebo effect of stimulus packages shows a shorter impact. Trillions of dollars spent create a small positive effect that lasts for less than three months but leaves a massive trail of debt behind.

Second, central banks are increasingly hostage to governments that simply will not curb deficit spending and will not implement structural reforms. The independence of the monetary authorities has long been questioned, but now it has become clear that governments are using loose policies as a tool to abandon structural reforms, not to buy time. No developed economy can tolerate a slight increase in government bond yields, and with sticky inflation in nonreplicable goods and services, this means stagnation with higher prices ahead, a bad omen for the overall economy.

Third, and more concerning, market participants know this and take incremental levels of risk knowing that central banks will not taper, which leads to a more fragile environment and extreme levels of complacency.

So-called value sectors have retraced in equity markets, which shows that the recovery has been priced and that the risk ahead is weakening margins and poor growth, while the traditional beneficiaries of “low rates forever” have soared to new highs.

Despite rating agencies’ concerns about the rising figure of fallen angel debt, there is extreme complacency among investors looking for yield, and they are buying junk bonds at the fastest pace in years despite a rising number of bankruptcies.

Central banks justify these actions based on the view that inflation is transitory but ignore the risks of elevated prices even if the pace of increase in those prices slows down. If food and energy prices rise 30 percent, then fall 5 percent, that is not “transitory” to consumers who are suffering the above-headline increase in the prices of the things they purchase every day, a problem that occurred already in 2020 and 2019. The most negatively affected are the middle-low and poor classes, as they do not see a wealth effect from the rise in asset prices.

Sticky inflation and misguided loose fiscal and monetary policies are not tools for growth, but for stagnation and debt.

So far, central banks believe their policies are working, because equity and bond markets remain strong. That is like giving more vodka to an alcoholic because he has not died of cirrhosis yet. Low bond yields and high levels of negative-yielding debt are not signaling monetary success but are evidence of a deep disconnection between markets and the real economy.

Central banks have already stated that they will continue with ultraloose policies no matter what happens to inflation in at least a year and a half. For consumers that is a lot of time for weakening purchasing power of salaries and savings. Markets may continue to reward excess and high risk, but that is not something that should be ignored, let alone celebrated. Extreme risk will be blamed for the next crisis, as always, but the cause of that extreme risk -perennial loose monetary policy- will not stop. In fact, it will be used as the solution if there is a market collapse.

Central banks should be tapering already, and if they believe that low sovereign yields are justified by fundamentals, let markets prove it. If negative nominal and real yields are justified by the issuers’ solvency, why is there any need for monetary authorities to purchase 100 percent of net issuances? Reality is much scarier. If central banks started tapering, sovereign yields would soar to levels that would make many deficit-spending governments quake. Therefore, by keeping yields artificially low, central banks are also sowing the seeds of higher debt, lower productivity, and weaker growth—the recipe for crowding out, overcapacity, and stagnation.

Author:
Daniel Lacalle

Daniel Lacalle, PhD, economist and fund manager, is the author of the bestselling books Freedom or Equality (2020), Escape from the Central Bank Trap (2017), The Energy World Is Flat (2015), and Life in the Financial Markets (2014).

He is a professor of global economy at IE Business School in Madrid.

Consumer Expectations Don’t Tell Us Much about the Real State of the Economy

Frank Shostak

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

In order to gain insight into the current and future state of an economy, many economists hold that it is helpful to get the view on this from consumers and businesspersons. Randomly selected consumers and businesspersons are asked to provide their views about the current and the future state of the economy.

Fiat Money Economies Are Built on Lies

Thorsten Polleit

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

Now and then, it pays to take a step back to get a broader perspective on things, to look beyond the daily financial news, to see through the short-term ups and downs in the market to find out what is really at the heart of the matter. If we do that, we will not miss the fact that we are living in the age of fiat currencies, a world in which basically everything bears their fingerprints: the economic and financial system, politics—even people’s cultural norms, values, and morals will not escape the broader consequences of fiat currencies.

What Is the Purpose of the Economy? Carl Menger Explains.

Antony P. Mueller

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

This second part of the series about the Principles of Economics treats Menger’s exposition of the economy. In continuation of the first part, which covered the general concept of goods, the part on the economy treats the role of economic goods in relation to human wants. Based on the original version in German, published in 1871 as Grundsätze der Volkswirthschaftslehre, the following exposition tries to capture the spirit of the work, with all direct quotes in the text freshly translated for this article.

Investors Are on the Lookout for a Crash. But Prices Keep Going Up.

Doug French

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

An insider confided to a friend that all he is doing right now is transaction work for real estate holders who are selling now before the market crashes. His clients, members of Sin City’s illuminati, once bitten by the ‘08 crash, believe they’ll beat the crowd to the sales window before the local retail and office market collapses.

Will the Feds Try Price Controls to “Fix” Price Inflation?

Joseph Solis-Mullen

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

As it began rapidly expanding the money supply early in 2020, the Fed confidently assured the public there would be no unanticipated or serious rise in inflation. Now that their projections have failed to materialize (in fact, their forecasts were off by almost 40 percent), they assure us that this will be but a temporary spike.

The Fed Says It Stabilizes the Economy. I’m Skeptical.

Bill Bergman

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

Before, during, and after the 2007–09 financial crisis, the masthead of the Federal Reserve Board’s main webpage included the following assertion right below its name at the top of the page:

The Federal Reserve, the central bank of the United States, provides the nation with a safe, flexible and stable monetary and financial system.

This statement is still there today. Can we all breathe easier now? Maybe not, if we endured one of the worst financial crises ever while the Fed was championing itself as a source of stability.

Government Debt Is Starting to Look Almost as Sketchy as Payday Loans

Malachy McDermott

(Originally posted on Mises.org)

If there is one thing every honest money-saving advisor would agree on, it’s that a payday loan is a bad idea. Taking a high interest loan backed by nothing but your word to pay off your current account to fuel consumption with no capital investment is just leading you on the road to ruin.

Crypto Scammers Rip Off Billions as Pump-and-Dump Schemes Go Digital

Billions are getting pilfered annually through a variety of cryptocurrency scams. The way things are going, this will only get worse.

(Originally posted on Bloomberg.com)

By Misyrlena Egkolfopoulou and Charlie WellsJuly 8, 2021

Listen to The Money Chant of the Wolves of Crypto.

You remember The Money Chant: Matthew McConaughey thumping his chest, talking fools and money before — sniff! — a little lunchtime “tootski.”