The first eye-opening moment for an attentive student in a good introduction-to-economics class occurs when that young man or woman learns to see – or learns to look for – that which remains invisible to most people. Such a student starts to search for the unseen jobs lost as a result of the ‘seen’ jobs created or protected by tariffs. He or she begins to understand that government-imposed prohibitions on the free movement of prices and wages have unseen consequences – invariably bad, and typically borne disproportionately by the very persons the prohibitions are ostensibly meant to help. The man-in-the-street has lots of wrong-headed ideas about economics.
Tag: ignorance
“The Masses” Don’t Know and Don’t Care
You and I are not going to get through to most people. They simply don’t care if they are being enslaved or violated – especially if they believe they are being protected by someone else being “controlled” on their behalf.
Progressives Must Confront Their Racist Roots
In the early 20th century, the progressive definition of the common good was thoroughly infused with scientific racism.
Trump, Carrier, and the Corporate State
Should free-market advocates applaud the deal Donald Trump brokered to keep some Carrier jobs from being transferred to Mexico? I believe the right answer is no.
The Trouble With Socialist Anarchism
Written by Per Bylund. The new movie “V for Vendetta” has provoked public discussion of the meaning of anarchism. Murray Rothbard was an advocate of the stateless society, but he was never accepted by the anarchist movement and is still considered more a “capitalist lackey” than anarchist thinker. Indeed, anarcho-capitalism has always been considered an…
Children Don’t Give a Shit About Praise
I wanted to look at the relationship between the practice of praising children and human action (praxeology), which will lead us to an interesting conclusion.
David Hume on Self-Coordinating and Correcting Market Processes
David Hume emphasized that commerce and trade were among the most important avenues to offer opportunities to raise people’s standards of living, and to bring refinement and cultural betterment to a growing portion of a nation’s population.
The Pretense of Omniscience
The tragedy of the Great Leap Forward illustrates that the differences between a command and a market economy reflect a deep difference in mentality and attitude. A market economy can only be tolerated when no one is confident enough to claim omniscience.
Mostly Rational, Mostly Ignorant
I hear social commentators say that humans are mostly irrational, that they are way too often guided in their actions by emotion rather than by logic. While this isn’t untrue, I don’t think it means that humans are mostly irrational.
Why Would Anyone Want a President?
Apart from employees of the executive branch, or active-duty members of the military who have been called into service by Congress, no American really has a “president.” The office was intended to be peripheral to the daily concerns of Americans, rather than the central focus of their existence. What a wonderful thing it would be if Americans of all persuasions adopted the motto “Not My President” – and then learned to regard the state itself with the proper mixture of hostility and contempt.