The Human Action Podcast

Professor Jonathan Newman joins the show for a look at America's Great Depression, Rothbard's classic explanation of a terrible period in US history. This book provides one of the best short surveys of Austrian business cycle theory, along with deep history surrounding the inflationary run-up of the 1920s and the disastrous mistakes made by the "laissez-faire" Hoover administration in the 1930s. Any serious student of booms and busts needs to read this cautionary tale, as does anyone worried about unconstrained monetary policy in the wake of Covid-19 lockdowns. It can happen here, and it can happen again, if Rothbard's counsel goes unheard.

Find the online version of the book at https://Mises.org/GreatDepression

Receive a discount on America's Great Depression in the Mises Bookstore with code HAPOD15%

Scott Horton of antiwar.com and the Libertarian Institute has a new book chronicling 20 years of America's "War on Terror." Enough Already is a compelling history of modern US interventionism and a scathing critique of American foreign policy in the Middle East.

Horton joins Jeff Deist for a sobering look at American hubris overseas, along with the blowback and destruction it causes. You don't want to miss this conversation.

Guido Hülsmann's The Ethics of Money Production is a masterclass both on the fundamentals of money and the disastrous moral consequences of monetary "policy." Inflation is not only an economic problem which impoverishes us materially, but a deeply corrosive force in society for individuals. There is no better work to explain the broader implications of central banking which go almost totally unremarked in the financial press.

Podcaster Stephan Livera is a big fan of the book and joins the show to explain why you need to read it.

Guido Hülsmann's The Ethics of Money Production​: Mises.org/Ethics

Listen to Stephan's podcast at StephanLivera.com

Tom Woods joins the show for a special year-end show to make the case for becoming a serious reader in 2021!

Read Dr. David Gordon's 2020 book reviews at Mises.org/Gordon2020

Find all episodes of the Human Action Podcast at Mises.org/HAPod

Managerialism, not socialism or capitalism, dominated the West in the latter half of the 20th century. Nobody explained this better than James Burnham in his seminal 1941 book The Managerial Revolution: What is Happening in the World. Burnham challenges both Marxist orthodoxy on class (exploitation happens without capitalism) and libertarian orthodoxy on market firms (managerial control overtakes "owners"). This is hugely important book, and prescient to put it mildly: Burnham's thesis explains both the populist Trump revolution and the Deep State response. To understand modern politics and bureaucracy, and especially the DC Beltway, you need to read this book.

Edward Welsch, editor of Chronicles magazine, joins Jeff Deist for a thorough discussion of Burnham and his most influential work.

Watch Dan McCarthy on the history of Burnham at Mises.org/McCarthyBurnham

Read Samuel Francis's review of James Burnham's works at Mises.org/FrancisBurnham

Professor Janek Wasserman's book The Marginal Revolutionaries: How Austrian Economists Fought the War of Ideas, is an entertaining and fascinating account of key players and events in the evolution of Austrian school economics. Jeff Deist details the good, bad, and ugly of the book, written by a left-progressive historian from a critical perspective.

Read Jeff Deist's review at Mises.org/DeistWasserman

Read David Gordon's review at Mises.org/GordonWasserman

Find Hülsmann's biography of Mises at Mises.org/LastKnight

Read Mises on the history of the Austrian School at Mises.org/MisesHistory

Ryan McMaken joins the show to discuss Adam Fergusson's seminal history of Weimar-era hyperinflation in Germany, When Money Dies. Americans accustomed to the dollar's king status have no idea how quickly and brutally a currency can lose value, especially when war finance distorts the entire structure of a nation's economy.

What follows is sobering: hunger, violence, crime, and degradation. This fascinating book makes for a great study of how and why inflation rises quickly, and provides a cautionary tale for central banks and fiscal policy makers today.

Plus listen to the show for a link to your free copy of the book!

Read Hans Sennholz on Hyperinflation at Mises.org/HyperInflation

Find Henry Hazlitt's What You Should Know About Inflation at Mises.org/InflationHazlitt

Read Lyn Alden's article on inflation at Mises.org/Alden

Professor Per Bylund of Oklahoma State University is the author of The Seen, The Unseen, and the Unrealized. 2020 is the year social scientists failed to show us the unseen, namely the staggering and still unfolding economic, social, medical, and human costs of Covid lockdowns. Dr. Bylund and Jeff Deist discuss Covid and government responses against the backdrop of ripple effects, Say's law, "market failure," and the inability of bureaucrats to make rational tradeoffs. They also discuss Dr. Bylund's upcoming project for the Mises Institute: an Austrian economics primer, under 100 pages, available as a very inexpensive paperback.

Find Dr. Bylunds book at mises.org/Unrealized

And follow him on Twitter @PerBylund

Do we fund government or does government fund us? Can sovereign states issue currency at will without risk of default? Are government deficits actually a form of public wealth? And can newly issued currency (rather than taxes or bonds) be used to pay for public works, health care, college, entitlements, and guaranteed jobs? These are the arguments made by Professor Stephanie Kelton in The Deficit Myth, the latest addition to the "Modern Monetary Theory" concept. If it sounds too good to be true, it is—and Dr. Murphy joins the show to explain why.

Read Dr. Murphy's review of The Deficit Myth at mises.org/DeficitMyth

Why don't elections bring harmony and closure rather than ever greater political friction? Han-Hermann Hoppe explained all of the fundamental problems with mass democracy more than 20 years ago in Democracy: The God That Failed.

Jeff Deist finishes his series on this devastating classic with a look at Hoppe's final chapters, critiquing conservatism, liberalism, and constitutionalism. Why do both conservatism and liberalism fail? (hint: democratic mechanisms). Liberalism is property, not majority rule, and all governments tend to attack rather than defend property over time. So what is the best way forward, combining a liberal economic program with the old conservative understanding of natural order? And how do we get there? Don't miss this discussion of Hoppe's most controversial and forward-looking book.

Use the code HAPOD for a discount on Democracy: The God That Failed from our bookstore: Mises.org/BuyHoppe