Daily Articles

Book Review: Libertarianism

by Richard M. Ebeling March 1, 1997

Libertarianism: A Primer by David Boaz (New York: The Free Press 1997); 312 pages; $23.00. The greatest triumph of socialism during the last one hundred years has been the extent to which collectivist ideas dominate the vocabulary and the concepts of public policy. Socialism, ...

The FTC Strikes Again

by Sheldon Richman March 1, 1997

The Federal Trade Commission has once again dealt a blow to our allegedly free enterprise economy. The FTC plans to move against a proposed merger between Staples and Office Depot, two office supply chains. The commission claims the merger would violate the antitrust laws. Displaying its standard confusion over ...

A Vision of a Free Society, Part 1

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 1, 1997

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 If we abolish public schooling, then how will the poor be educated? If drug laws are repealed, won't everyone go on drugs? If Social Security is abolished, won't old people starve to death? If we don't have Medicare and Medicaid, how would ...

Monetary Central Planning and the State, Part 2: The Rationale of a Stable Price Level for Economic Stability

by Richard M. Ebeling February 1, 1997

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | ...

The President Goes Wrong on Education

by Sheldon Richman February 1, 1997

President Clinton has made education the centerpiece of his second administration. In his State of the Union address he introduced a multifaceted program that would cost $51 billion in the coming fiscal year. The program is expensive, but perhaps worse, it is wrong-headed. We need Washington to do less, not ...

The Tragedy of the Public Schools Continues

by Sheldon Richman February 1, 1997

Judging from the newspapers, it's been a rough time for the public schools. Control of the Washington, D.C., schools was taken away from the elected school board by an financial oversight body set up by Congress and turned over to a new board of trustees. At the same time, ...

The Evils of Economic Sanctions [long]

by Sheldon Richman February 1, 1997

Americans are undoubtedly sleeping soundly in the knowledge that U.S. Customs agents in the last year tripled the number of Cuban cigars seized before they could be brought into the country. The Customs Service says that it grabbed nearly 90,000 cigars, thwarting 1,285 acts of smuggling. The cigars were valued at more than $1 million. That may sound impressive, but ...

Destroying Families for the Glory of the Drug War, Part 1

by James Bovard February 1, 1997

Part 1 | Part 2 Few programs better symbolize the arrogance, propaganda, and political opportunism of the drug war than the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program. DARE is the most popular antidrug education program in America. Labeled by the Chicago Tribune as "a darling of America's drug war," DARE is currently being taught by police officers to ...

The Individual in Society, Part 1

by Ludwig von Mises February 1, 1997

Part 1 | Part 2 The words freedom and liberty signified for the most eminent representatives of mankind one of the most precious and desirable goods. Today it is fashionable to sneer at them. They are, trumpets the modern sage, "slippery" notions and "bourgeois" prejudices. Freedom and liberty are not to be found in nature. In nature there ...

Clinton’s State of Mind Address

by Sheldon Richman February 1, 1997

President Clinton tells the American people that the "era of big government is over" and that "government is not the solution," but considering what he had to say in his State of the Union Address, he surely does not believe it. Clinton's speech was little more than a laundry list of things ...

Book Review: Austrian Economics

by Richard M. Ebeling February 1, 1997

Austrian Economics: An Anthology edited by Bettina Bien Greaves (Irvington-on-Hudson, N.Y.: The Foundation for Economic Education 1996); 166 pages; $14.95. Just a little over one hundred years ago, in 1896, the Austrian economist Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk published a 120-page monograph entitled "Karl Marx and the Close of His System." It offered, up to that time, the most detailed critical evaluation ...

Monetary Central Planning and the State

by Richard M. Ebeling February 1, 1997

  Part 1: A Little Bit of Inflation Never Hurt Anyone. Right? Part 2: The Rationale of a Stable Price Level for Economic Stability Part 3: The Federal Reserve and Price-Level Stabilization in the 1920s Part 4: Benjamin Anderson and the False Goal of Price-Level Stabilization Part 5: The Austrian Economists on the Origin and Purchasing Power of Money Part 6: Ludwig von Mises and ...