Recently, I have been reading many socio-economic articles and writings, and the name Ludwig von Mises has been mentioned and referenced more than once. I know he was a revered Austrian economist and social philospher, who many attribute the libertarian movement to. There are many documents on the Internet profiling his views, biography and accomplishment (of which I am trying to sift useful information from), but I wanted to get some input from the forum on this historical man. What are your views on the man, Ludwig von Mises?
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I have read a little bit about the Austrian School of Economics, of which von Mises was the leading philosopher. So far, I am very impressed by the underlying principles, and find many of my own ideas contained within them.
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I've never looked into the life of Mises so I'm not sure I can be of any asisstance here other than to say that judging by what I have read of his, and judging by the stature of men that speak good of him, I would say he was a pretty savvy guy!
He supported the free market and individualism so he has my support! A lot of his books (including a book about his life) can be found at lfb.com
Dubhdara.
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Ludwig von Mises: A voice of sanity in a quickly deteriorating economic world.
Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973)
by Murray N. Rothbard
"Economics deals with society's fundamental problems; it concerns everyone and belongs to all. It is the main and proper study of every citizen."
One of the most notable economists and social philosophers of the twentieth century, Ludwig von Mises, in the course of a long and highly productive life, developed an integrated, deductÂive science of economics based on the fundamental axiom that inÂdividual human beings act purposively to achieve desired goals. Even though his economic analysis itself was "value-free" -- in the sense of being irrelevant to values held by economists, Mises concluded that the only viable economic policy for the human race was a policy of unrestricted laissez-faire, of free markets and the unhampered exercise of the right of private property, with government strictly limited to the defense of person and property within its territorial area.
For Mises was able to demonstrate (a) that the expansion of free markets, the division of labor, and private capital investment is the only possible path to the prosperity and flourishing of the human race; ( that socialism would be disastrous for a modern economy because the absence of private ownership of land and capital goods prevents any sort of rational pricing, or estimate of costs, and © that government intervention, in addition to hampering and crippling the market, would prove counter-productive and cumulative, leading inevitably to socialism unless the entire tissue of interventions was repealed.
Holding these views, and hewing to truth indomitably in the face of a century increasingly devoted to statism and collectivism, Mises became famous for his "intransigence" in insisting on a non-inflationary gold standard and on laissez-faire.
https://www.mises.org/content/mises.asp
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