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Quote of the Day

From the eminently quotable Tim Taylor:

FDR and others saw Hoover during the 1920s as a possible presidential candidate for the Democrats

Another myth that dies hard. Hoover the free-market ideologue. Same ol’ stuff that prevails today. I had a student telling me the other day that the Fed manipulating interest rates was why he hated capitalism.

Hilariously, when I try to describe to folks what “capitalism” actually is, I get harangued as someone who is imposing his values on others. What should I do, just shake my head and say, yes you are right, crony capitalism and government intervention (perhaps on behalf of corporate interests) is exactly what I advocate, what Smith advocated, what current market economists advocate, and demonstrably works better than the real thing?

2 Responses to “Quote of the Day”

  1. Harry says:

    The idea that the Fed can manipulate interest rates is an old idea, in comparison to the ideas of Milton Friedman. The idea that the Fed should have a labor dollar goes back to the days when Hubert Humphrey was a senator, which was a few decades before Friedman won the Nobel prize for economic work that was congruent with his core principles.

    The people protesting on Wall Street against capitalism evidently missed Wall Street moving about twenty years ago, an old fact. Maybe they are puzzled why Citi does not hire them as tellers or at the bond window, where they used to clip coupons on bearer bonds.

  2. All the clones in Brave New World are identified with great collectivists from the Age of Ford: Benito Hoover, Polly Trotsky, Lenina Crowne, Mustapha Mond…
    See here.

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