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Ludwig von Mises

Ludwig von Mises Quotes

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Famous Ludwig von Mises Quotes

“In the socialist commonwealth every economic change becomes an undertaking whose success can be neither appraised in advance nor later retrospectively determined. There is only groping in the dark. Socialism is the abolition of rational economy.”

DarkEconomyEconomicDeterminedSocialismRationalSocialistUndertakingsAbolitionCommonwealthEconomic Change
Book:Economic Calculation In the Socialist Commonwealth
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“The luxury of today is the necessity of tomorrow. Every advance first comes into being as the luxury of a few rich people, only to become, after a time, an indispensable necessity taken for granted by everyone. Luxury consumption provides industry with the stimulus to discover and introduce new, things. It is one of the dynamic factors in our economy. To it we owe the progressive innovations by which the standard of living of all strata of the population has been gradually raised.”

PeopleFirstsHas BeensTodayEconomyRichTakenIndustryTomorrowStandardsInnovationRaisedPopulationFactorsLuxuryGrantedProgressiveIntroducingNew ThingsConsumptionIndispensableRich PeopleStimulusStandards Of LivingTaken For Granted
Book:Liberalism: The Classical Tradition: The Economist
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“History does not provide any example of capital accumulation brought about by a government. As far as governments invested in the construction of roads, railroads, and other useful public works, the capital needed was provided by the savings of individual citizens and borrowed by the government.”

DoeGovernmentIndividualExampleNeededCitizensSavingConstructionSavingsAccumulationBorrowedRailroads
Book:Human action: a treatise on economics
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“True, governments can reduce the rate of interest in the short run. They can issue additional paper money. They can open the way to credit expansion by the banks. They can thus create an artificial boom and the appearance of prosperity. But such a boom is bound to collapse soon or late and to bring about a depression.”

WayGovernmentRunningInterestIssuesPaperLateRateBoundsProsperityAppearanceCreditArtificialCollapseExpansionPaper Money
Book:Omnipotent Government: The Rise of the Total State and Total War
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“As soon as we surrender the principle that the state should not interfere in any questions touching on the individuals mode of life, we end by regulating and restricting the latter down to the smallest details.”

ShouldEndsStatesIndividualPrinciplesDetailsSurrenderLatterTouchingSmallestInterfere
Book:The free and prosperous commonwealth: an exposition of the ideas of classical liberalism
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“The gold standard did not collapse. Governments abolished it in order to pave the way for inflation. The whole grim apparatus of oppression and coercion, policemen, customs guards, penal courts, prisons, in some countries even executioners, had to be put into action in order to destroy the gold standard.”

WayCountryWholeGovernmentActionOrderStandardsGoldCourtPrisonOppressionCustomsCollapseInflationPolicemenCoercionGrimExecutionersGold Standard
Author:Ludwig von Mises
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“Governments, political parties, pressure groups, and the bureaucrats of the educational hierarchy think they can avoid the inevitable consequences of unsuitable measures by boycotting and silencing the independent economists. But truth persists and works, even if nobody is left to utter it.”

IfsThinkingGovernmentPoliticalLeftPartyGroupsConsequencePressureIndependentEducationalInevitablePersistEconomistPolitical PartiesHierarchyBureaucratsSilencingPressure Groups
Author:Ludwig von Mises
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“The riches of the rich are not the cause of the poverty of anybody; the process that makes some people rich is, on the contrary, the corollary of the process that improves many peoples want satisfaction. The entrepreneurs, the capitalists and the technologists prosper as far as they succeed in best supplying the consumers.”

PeopleWantCausesProcessPovertyRichSucceedEntrepreneurSatisfactionRichesContraryConsumersCapitalist
Book:Anti-Capitalistic Mentality, The
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“If the practice persists of covering government deficits with the issue of notes, then the day will come without fail, sooner or later, when the monetary systems of those nations pursuing this course will break down completely. The purchasing power of the monetary unit will decline more and more, until finally it disappears completely.”

IfsGovernmentCoursesNationsBreakPracticeIssuesFailingNotesDisappearDeclineSooner Or LaterPersistUnitsBreaking DownDeficitCoveringMonetaryPurchasingMonetary SystemPurchasing PowerDisappear Completely
Book:On the Manipulation of Money and Credit
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“State interference in economic life, which calls itself economic policy, has done nothing but destroy economic life. Prohibitions and regulations have by their general obstructive tendency fostered the growth of the spirit of wastefulness.”

StatesDoneSpiritGrowthEconomicPolicyTendenciesRegulationInterferenceProhibitionEconomic PolicyWastefulness
Book:Socialism - An Economic and Sociological Analysis: The Economist
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“The worship of the state is the worship of force. There is no more dangerous menace to civilization than a government of incompetent, corrupt, or vile men. The worst evils which mankind ever had to endure were inflicted by governments.”

MenStatesGovernmentEvilForceWorstMankindDangerousCivilizationWorshipEndureMenaceIncompetent
Book:Omnipotent Government: The Rise of the Total State and Total War
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“Credit expansion is the governments' foremost tool in their struggle against the market economy. In their hands it is the magic wand designed to conjure away the scarcity of capital goods, to lower the rate of interest or to abolish it altogether, to finance lavish government spending, to expropriate the capitalists, to contrive everlasting booms, and to make everybody prosperous.”

HandsGovernmentInterestStruggleEconomyMagicToolsRateCreditSpendingFinanceGoodsCapitalistExpansionEverlastingProsperousAbolishScarcityWandsMarket EconomyGovernment SpendingMagic Wands
Book:Human action: a treatise on economics
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“War is harmful, not only to the conquered but to the conqueror. Society has arisen out of the works of peace; the essence of society is peacemaking. Peace and not war is the father of all things. Only economic action has created the wealth around us; labor, not the profession of arms, brings happiness. Peace builds, war destroys.”

WarActionFatherWealthEconomicArmsLaborAll ThingsEssenceProfessionMaking PeaceConquerorPeacemaking
Book:Socialism - An Economic and Sociological Analysis: The Economist
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“There is, in fact, only one solution: the state, the government, the laws must not in any way concern themselves with schooling or education. Public funds must not be used for such purposes. The rearing and instruction of youth must be left entirely to parents and to private associations and institutions”

WayStatesFactsGovernmentLawUsedPurposeLeftParentYouthSolutionsConcernInstitutionsFundAssociationInstructionSchooling
Book:The free and prosperous commonwealth: an exposition of the ideas of classical liberalism
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