Without a doubt. Some institutions like LvMI are private. They don’t rely on state coercion for their funding. People like Ron Paul, and Schiff bring new blood AND donors. Of course, the people receiving subsidies never consider the costs of operation, because they are divorced from having to earn their funding in a competitive market.
Just got the book through the mail today. Ron Paul, in the book, is pretty clear about who are his influences and where his opinions stem from. In other words, I think he does a good job in directing the reader towards other sources. It’s clear that Ron Paul’s objective is not to write a book on the scale of Murray N. Rothbard’s histories, but only as a simple-to-read primer on the subject (similar to Meltdown, in fact).
And Ron Paul has done much to expose a larger audience to AE. That you steadfastly believe that a PhD is required to talk about econ is your problem.
Absolutely. He is principled & radical, an abolitionist. Part of his goal is directing people to the Austrian School of Economics and he’s said so himself, he would not have had a political career if it wasn’t for the Austrian school.
@Giles
Whoops, I didn’t realize I was essentially making the same argument as physiocrat. Any unique arguments I raised are kind of secondary, thanks for the reply anyway.
Some quick minor clarifications
It is also probably an academician’s responsibility to separate themselves from “pop” discussions as much as possible.
By this I meant: While studying, critiquing, etc AE in a more serious environment don’t concern yourself with inferior literature or discussions. Talking to lay people however is a different story. Fortunately for this world we have a handful of people like Friedman who were gifted at both; but I think Freidman had two different “modes” Freidman the scientist and Freidman the presenter of ideas. I don’t think Freidman the scientist would have been too concerned about Michael Moore or what his followers thought of capitalism, but he may have been concerned with Galbraith.
I think the problem is; even a Freidman is not as cool, attention grabbing, or exiting to listen to (in the views of most people) as a Michael Moore or even a known politician (such as Ron Paul).
I think you need to be a bit more explicit about what you mean when you say “impact”.
By “impact” I mean within the structure of our political system (mass democracy, strong central governments, mass media with short attention spans, etc) I am of the opinion that when it comes to political change we are probably more susceptible to populists in not only public opinion but policy making as well. I was just speaking of social/political, when it comes to having impact on the profession of economicsyou are correct.
I believe a certain amount of this controversy is based on a misunderstanding. Correct me if I am wrong, but “advancing Austrian Economics” can refer to two very different phenomena, the first of which is clarifying relationships between actors and incentives, touching up unfinished or unsatisfactory areas (capital theory, what have you), and additional research. This is largely the focus of the GMU crowd, which I think deserves more attention that it currently does. Obviously RP has not done much to further AE in this regard.
The second way advancing AE can be interpreted is furthering the understanding or acceptance of the body of knowledge that currently exists. This is where Ron Paul and Peter Schiff have really excelled. I also was introduced to AE through Ron Paul, and am grateful for it.
I think Giles is primarily concerned with the former area of advancement. This also explains his focus on publishing in top journals and achieving mainstream academic credibility, as there is a wider acceptance of heterodox economic thought. Mainstream and orthodox lines of thought are shifting, and the Austrian focus on radical subjectivism and the structure of capital can be adopted into a new orthodoxy. This is the focus of many Austrians, particularly the GMU crowd.
I don’t think the two are mutually exclusive, do you?
Giles’ trolling now is called ‘controversy’ ? That’s like, more dignified ? But it’s still cheap trolling.
Anyone who knows anything about what is actually practiced in sciences knows that the pursuit of truth is hardly a high priority in practice.
Must, get, that, research grant!
I fail to see why speeches about the ABCT and gold standard are only going to be divisive? Possibly because he’s background is Rothbardian monetary theory? It’s true you don’t need to be an Austrian to show that the Fed causes the business cycle, you could be a monetarist. However to consistently argue to allow the necessary monetray contraction to purge the economy you need to be.
Well you never know I might wind up being in those fringe movements: the offical 9/11 story has more holes in the Swiss banking system thanks to the USA and I’m a libertarian. All economists are going to have political convictions which you’re not going to be easily hidden. It just so happens that most Austrian economists fall under free marketers and are thus right wing and evil- can’t help that.
Bob Murphy was a lecturer or a Professor for a time and didn’t like it so left; can’t blame him for that.
I don’t think AE is propogandised on anti-intellectual grounds- it’s sold on the grounds it’s radical and heterodox hence why attracts angry young men like ourselves. It does to tap into most people’s dislike of maths but I think re-evaluating the usefulness of maths in the public is rather useful- hopefully they might be slightly more wary of statistics. Quite a lot modern maths though I think is on shaky grounds- for example Set Theory which Wiggenstein found fault with. So a method which spurs the re-evaluation of maths in areas of study can hopefully reverse the rank scientism in many areas.
You suggest the govenment is not always inefficient and have done on other threads but haven’t given a reason why they can be efficient. Is there anything wrong with this syllogism:
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All monopolies are always inefficient (Rothbardian monopoly theory)
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The government is a monopoly.
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Therefore the government always inefficient.
Quoted for truth.
Giles is concerned with advancement but the question of how you do it is a seperate question. As I’ve said before focusing on getting published in the top journals can lead to compronise and a syncretism with the current orthodoxy. I also think it’s pertinent that it’s the Boettke crowd who are pushing this method: they are Hayekians and thus from my purist scientific perspective already tainted by moving from the rationalist (Kantian/Aristotielian) grounds of Misesian economics.
That is way too true.
At the risk of turning this personal, I’ll defend myself. To be honest, I’ve not seen much on my behalf, not recently at least, that would constitute “trolling”, “hateful remarks”, “blathering” or “complaining”. If you wish to prove the contrary go for it, but for the most part my interest now lies in honest economic discussion that will allow me to clarify my own thoughts. Of course, when I was a self described “Hoppean” things were somewhat different, and your remarks would indeed hold true, but I’ve since withdrawn commetns I’ve made, recanted views I once held and apologized to the parties involved.
By the way, I didn’t “lie”, I admit, I misintepreted what you said.
I’ve also never claimed so much as having spoken to any of the GMU economists. Besides enjoying their work and “consuming” quite a bit of it, there really is no link between them and myself.
Now, I believe your response to Nitro has some interesting aspects, so if you don’t mind I’ll comment on that.
You write “but bad ideas shouldn’t be profitable in the long run.”, but so far what you’ve been writing is that no ideas are all that profitable in the long run in a free market. Or at least, the economics that fills academic papers is of little worth in the long run. Of course, I agree with this entirely. But I don’t see any reason why bad ideas should be particularly less profitable in the long run (or at least, why it need be a priori true that they are).
I also agree that the current system insulates a lot of the work academics do from the price system and thus leads to resources that aren’t rationally allocated. But, I don’t really see how bears on what I was saying with regards to the truth value of the work in question. To be honest, my personal preference in this regard would be to override the price system in favour of science, but there we go.
Perhaps I overstated my case. Hutt says that the reason that Keynesian economics was so popular was because it was in favour with the politicians shortly after (and even today) Keynes’ wrote The General Theory. Now of course, since then it’s true that economists have, by and large, rejected Keynesian theorizing (and almost all have dropped the economics of Keynes himself). However, the interesting point is that few economists would describe themselves as “Keynesian”, in fact, as Cochrane says in his response to Krugman, people don’t really take it that seriously anymore. Nonetheless, it’s in favour with the politicians and the popular press.
So whilst it’s true that coercion, of however you want to put it, and validity might be related (think biology under the Nazi regime) I think we should always strive to give scholars the benefit of the doubt. I suppose my problem is simply that Austrian Economics becomes the “Keynesian economics of the right” of whatever else. Whereas politicians and Krugman expouse Keynesian policies, Ron Paul, self described “anarcho capitalists” and otherwise angry young men use “Austrian economics”.
Well, I think a few points are relevant:
- There was far, far more low hanging fruit when Hazlitt was around.
- Hazlitt was an excellent writer, indeed, he was trained as a journalist, but contrast Paul is hardly the world’s best speaker.
- Ron Paul already has the reputation as something of a kook and is associated with fringe movements, I’m not aware of anything comparable with regards to Hazlitt.
- The intellectual climate was slightly different around those days, Keynesian economics was actually taken seriously and economics as a science was considerably less developed.
So, I suppose my point isn’t that I think Ron Paul should stay away from Austrian economics because he doesn’t have a PhD. My point is that Paul should stop going out about “the structure of production” because I don’t think he can help Austrian economics in this way.
Of course I think it’s necessary to seperare the two. But I still don’t think that intellectuals should confine themselves to the ivory tower. I read quite a few blogs by economics, most of them are intelligible (sp?) to the layman. I think that’s a really great thing, but when it comes to journals papers they shouldn’t necessarily to comprehensible to the lay individual (myself included).
For example, I think Bob Murphy is really gifted at presenting ideas to the lay person. Same goes for Russ Roberts, I listen to EconTalk a lot and I really get the impression that Roberts knows exactly what the lay person might not understand and as such tells his guest to slow down or to elaborate. Both Murphy and Roberts (I’m sure I could think of more if I thought for longer) are examples of scholars who have a gift from communicating what is obviously a deep understanding of economics to either non-economists or younger economists.
The problem is, I don’t think Ron Paul has such a deep knowledge, nor do I think he’s very good at getting it across. Combine that with all the other baggage associated with the Paul movement and I don’t think it’s good for AE.
Well, when you mean it in that way I don’t think intellectuals have much of an impact in the short run (perhaps slightly more of an impact in the long run). Look how long Keynesian ideas have persisted amongst policy makers when they’ve been out of fashion with academics. Of course, if you want to make your impact as big as possible, I don’t think babbling on about “the structure of production”, “the natural interest rate” or whatever else is the best way to go.
Of course, I too am grateful for being introduced to economic science by Ron Paul. My trip took a bit of a detour through Hoppe, but I’ve recovered from that now! More seriously though, I think the point is, as I said to Dondolee, that I’m not too sure Ron Paul can do it. I hear a lot of people talking about how Ron Paul has got a bunch of kids introduced to Austrian economics, but what are these kids doing? Ultimately, if these kids are just going to write on their blogs or post on forums without really advancing Austrian economics, I don’t think his campaign can be seen as much of an acheivement in this respect.
Now, if in 10 or 20 years we see a significant number of young economists claiming that Ron Paul is their reason for becoming academics, then I’ll take what I’ve said back. The problem is that I see a lot of people on these forums who credit RP with being here, but besides myself (and I think Krazy Kaju), very few of them are even going for degrees in economics, let alone aspiring to become academics (as I do). Clearly, this is just a small sample of the people RP has “converted”, but if it’s indicative I think I’m correct in coming down on the negative with regards to RP advocacy of AE.
I really didn’t intend on Paul being directly compared to Hazlitt. However, I really don’t see what Paul’s speaking skills have to do with his writing skills, as they are very different fields. I don’t think his reputation has anything to do with his understanding of AE, I think, as Gene Callahan has pointed out, any heterodox school of though it bound to attract various form of “kooks.” And I think the more laymen even with a very minimal understanding of good economics is desperately needed today, particularly with Krugmanite-Keynesian economics dominating the political arena.
I really don’t see how he could harm AE by talking about the structure of production, the average person doesn’t have a good grasp of it, so I think its beneficial to the public at the very least. But I really don’t know how much that has to do with his book.
When Friedman and Hayek (or even Rothbard, Yeager or White) advocate ending the Federal Reserve and moving to some sort of free market monetary system you can be sure that that they’ve done the necessary research. I think it’s safe to assume, concerning monetary theorists such as Yeager and White, that they’ve read large amounts of literature in favour of central banks and other such arrangements. I don’t think the same can be said for Ron Paul, even if he is thoroughly well read (debatable, to say the least) on the arguments against central banking, is he as well read on the literature against free banking? I doubt it.
Writing a book entitled End the Fed is what’s divisive! Not his Rothbardian monetary theory (although, that certainly doesn’t help, if they’re spitting out their drinks when he says “end the Fed”, they’re laughing when he says “and FRB!”).
Ron Paul is not an economist thought, that’s sort of the point! Look, it’s one thing for Ludwig von Mises to say something along the lines of “from my study of economics, I believe the free market is the only system under which the division of labour is capable of sustaining and expanding itself. As such, I believe liberalism is necessary for social cooperation” and then going on to advocate such a system. The problem with Paul is that his “support” for Austrian economics look ad hoc and ill informed. It looks as if he calls himself an Austrian either because like him, they mostly reach free market conclusions or because he just can’t quite understand those DSGE models used by other economists.
Obviously, I’ve overstated my case with the last two or so sentences, nonetheless, I think the point is clear.
And, of course, I don’t. I don’t mean to blame him for disliking acadamia and as such leaving, rather, my point was that Murphy is indicative on many scholars associated with the LvMI who focus almost exclusively on the public intellectual work. Even those who would claim to be advancing Austrian economics, write papers and books so full of angry rhetoric and insults that it’s hard to call it anything besides propaganda. Dislike Hayek as much as you will, but the way he conducted himself was exemplary, and too emulate his behaviour.
I think you, sort of, contradict yourself here. You start off by writing that “AE is [not] propogandised on anti-intellectual grounds”, only to claim that the reason so many people buy into it is because it’s “radical”, “heterodox” and because it taps into a “dislike of maths”. But none of those have any bearing on its truth value (nor does the last, since the reason most people dislike math, at least those associated with AE, rarely concerns its truth value).
Look around the Mises blog, or even these fora. You’ll see proclamations of “hatred for the state” a plenty, very little critical analysis of Rothbard, Hoppe and Mises and far too many uncritical dismissals of Friedman, Keynes and unfortunately Hayek. But what else does one expect when the LvMI markets itself to the layman on such grounds.
The first, because I side with Mises on monopoly theory and I don’t think monopolies are always inefficient. In fact, I don’t think the use of the term “efficiency” in economics is particularly useful (nor congruent with the rest of Austrian theory).
Yes, it can lead to compromise. Of course, plenty of other things can lead to compromise and publishing solely in Austrian journals and insulating oneself from criticism will lead to a state of affairs in which little progress is being made, fallacious arguments and incorrect analysis of the evidence goes unchallenged and a sort of groupthink becomes dominant.
To be honest, I think your analysis of Boettke et al being “tainted” is highly incorrect (I think Hayek and Kirzner have as much, if not more, claim to Mises than Rothbard does) and somewhat doctrinaire. But this is neither the time nor the place.
Three more points to other posters:
- LS, upon reconsideration, what you claim about science being insulated from profit and loss accounting is at least as true, if not more, about Ron Paul.
- To those who say that my opinion is somewhat odd due to the fact that I am here because of Paul, and yet, I criticize him. There’s nothing odd about that, the fact that Paul helped in the formation of my current views is a historical accident. Just like WWII scholars who lament the holocaust wouldn’t be where they are without it, the same applies here (not that I am of any comparable stature, of course).
- I’m going to issue the same, albeit somewhat unfair, challenge as I did before. Simply pointing out that Paul brought people to AE is meaningless if you can’t show how those scholars (presumably anyway) have in some way, shape or form advanced economic science in the Austrian tradition.
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Ron Paul led me to AE
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I wish Ron Paul would stop leading people to AE
Right, nothing strange there. Admit it Giles, you’re biting the hand that pointed you towards the food, for lack of a more coherent metaphor. You wouldn’t be here to complain about RP if RP hadn’t pointed you here in the first place. Don’t you think it’s a little selfish to benefit from RP’s support for AE and then ridicule him for attempting to provide the same benefit to others?
Why so elitist? Can’t AE be for the laymen to enjoy as well as the scholars? Is AE something to be shared in an exclusive club of intellectuals who are published in peer-reviewed journals, or can it also be for the everyday person who wants to learn more about economic science?
I will focus on this part of your post, for now (I have class); you have a very skewed interpretation on what “advancing” Austrian economics is. Face it, not everybody is interested in becoming an academic in the arts. That does not mean that introducing the general population to economics is not advancing Austrian economics. Austrian economics gains as much strength from advancing its support base, as it does from increasing the amount of intellectuals that continue to evolve it as a number of theories. Or, do you think that Keynes’ success was based entirely on the fact that it attracted a large number of intellectuals? No. The majority of Keynesians are not even economists.
You criticize Ron Paul for bringing about some type of internet revolution, where “kids” without degrees in economics are writing on their blogs. What’s so bad about this? How does this hurt Austrian economics? The simple answer is that it does not.
You are presenting a very condescending argument, and the argument is wrong. You assume that advancing this particular school of economics can be done by improving upon the theory. No, you’re wrong. Advancing this particular school of economics also includes widening the amount of people that are aware of its existence.
Do you think that any given Austrian economics did much in forcing Krugman to take Austrian theories into consideration? No. Austrian economics have been writing entire books for a century already. Opposition is forced to criticize Austrian economics because their ideas are being more widely accepted by the general population.
Giles,
I think you are all upset over how nobody may actually give a crap about your Economics degree. Too bad! You should have studied Engineering!
You can do both like myself, just say goodbye to fun. [:(]
I find it ironic that Giles wants Ron Paul to stop bringing people to Austrian Economics when it was Ron Paul who brought the greatest economic thinker since Peter Bottke to Austrian Economics, Giles. Lol. 
That’s nice. But you’re still just lying through your teeth when on the one hand you claim that a PhD isn’t required to talk about econ, and then in the next breath you all but demand one.
It’s time for you to realize that some of the “experts”–aren’t. All the PhDs in the world can’t save you if you proceed from false premises or use fallacious reasoning.