Cafe Hayek

Tom Palmer's New Book

The next book on my reading list: Tom Palmer's Realizing Freedom.  It promises to be an eloquent and educating read.

Zywicki on The Price of Everything

Here.

A minor key

Mark Helprin on William Jovanovich, the publisher:

He was brilliant, courageous, far-seeing, daring, and deep. Unlike many of his shallow counterparts, he was aware that mortality gives to our lives, no matter how glorious, a signature in a minor key.

Hayek on the Totalitarian Surprise

I mark this 110th anniversary of the birth of F.A. Hayek with this quotation from his 1944 book The Road to Serfdom; it's from the opening paragraph of Chapter XIII, entitled "The Totalitarians In Our Midst":

Probably it is true that the very magnitude of the outrages committed by the totalitarian governments, instead of increasing the fear that such a system might one day arise in more enlightened countries, has rather strengthened the assurance that it cannot happen here....  But let us not forget that fifteen years ago the possibility of such a thing happening in Germany would have appeared just as fantastic, not only to nine-tenths of the Germans themselves, but also to the most hostile foreign observers (however wise they may now pretend to have been).

A Man Apart

This book, co-edited by my friend G.M. Curtis, looks like a great read!

Higgs on the Economy, Economics, and Economists

The great economic historian Robert Higgs was interviewed recently on C-SPAN2's "Book tv."  The interview is three-hours long; every minute is worth watching.

As regular readers of this blog know, I greatly admire Bob's work (and Bob personally).  His 2006 book Depression, War, and Cold War is just out in paperback; this book -- data-rich and well-argued -- effectively challenges the claim that the New Deal helped to improve the American economy during the 1930s, and the claim that war and military spending promote prosperity.

Oh, and his 1987 book Crisis and Leviathan is, justifiably, a classic.

Moral Sentiments Book Club schedule

Just a heads up to anyone interested in the EconTalk book club on The Theory of Moral Sentiments. On April 15th, we'll release the discussion of Part I of the book. On April 22, we discuss Part II. We expect to do two more podcasts after that discussing Parts III through VI. (Not sure we're going to say much about Part VII, Smith's overview of other systems other than what we discussed in the intro/overview podcast.) Not sure how we'll divide up the Parts between those two--we're going to be a little flexible and see what happens.

Bottom line--if you're interested in reading along, basically you'll want to get to Part I by April 15 and try to finish the whole book by May 6.

If you don't have time to read along, you will still get a lot out of the discussions if the topics and ideas are your cup of tea. Dan and I recorded two podcasts yesterday. Basically, Dan goes through Smith's arguments very systematically and we talk about them. It was a lot of fun and look forward to keeping a conversation going in the comments section to each podcast as we release them.

EconTalk Book Club—The Theory of Moral Sentiments

The latest episode of EconTalk is the first installment of a series of podcasts with my colleague Dan Klein on The Theory of Moral Sentiments by Adam Smtih. This first installment is an overview of key passages and ideas to help readers follow long as we read through the rest of the book. Subsequent episodes will be released on Wednesdays as bonus podcasts. The next episode will be released April 15th and will cover Part I of the book. If you want to read along, you can find the book here along with a tentative schedule and other resources. By the way, 2009 is the 250th anniversary of the first publication of The Theory of Moral Sentiments.

Nice review of the Price of Everything

By E. Frank Stephenson.

Higgs In Depth

Bob Higgs will appear on Book TV next week.  I'll be watching!

More on The Price of Everything

The Price of Everything is now available on the Kindle. (The earlier murky version has been fixed.) The book version between real covers is out of stock at Amazon but that is supposed to change later this week. And here is an hour long interview with me about the book on KUER in Salt Lake City. We also talk about the current state of the economy and the stimulus plan.

Sweet Freedom

I just read Irene Nemirovsky's novel Suite Francaise.  In my opinion, it's wonderful (although I've no particular expertise at literary criticism or assessment).  The story is set in France during the Nazi invasion and occupation of that country in the early 1940s.

I'd still love this novel even if it didn't contain these wonderful lines (on page 297); they are the thoughts of a main character, Lucile Angellier, whose small town in France -- and whose home -- is occupied by the Nazis:

I want to be free.  I'm not asking for superficial freedom, the freedom to travel, to leave this house (even though that would be unimaginably blissful).  I'd rather feel free inside -- to choose my own path, never to waver, not to follow the swarm.  I hate this community spirit they go on and on about.  The Germans, the French, the Gaullists, they all agree on one thing: you have to love, think, live with other people, as part of a state, a country, a political party.  Oh, my God!  I don't want to!

Kindle Problem?

A reader wrote me to let me know that his Kindle copy of The Price of Everything was messed up--some of the letters were ghostly. Amazon says there's a problem with the file. If you have that problem, Amazon will refund your money and you should be able to buy a healthy copy in a few days. I will keep you posted.

Tamny on The Price of Everything

John Tamny reviews The Price of Everything at RealClearMarkets.

Quick reviews

Thomas Oliver and Gene Epstein like The Price of Everything. Thank you, gentlemen.

The Price of Everything on the Kindle

The Price of Everything is now available on the Kindle.

Invisible Hook

My GMU colleague Pete Leeson's new book -- The Invisible Hook: The Hidden Economics of Pirates -- is now available at Amazon.com for pre-order.  (Sorry; no pirated page proofs are available.  So buy the book!)

Book Forum at Cato

Here on audio or video is the talk I gave yesterday at the Cato Institute on The Price of Everything. Skip ahead to the end of my remarks which are mediocre, and listen to Nick Gillespie who did a superb job capturing what I am trying to do in the book.

Interview on The Price of Everything

Here's an interview with me about The Price of Everything from the Logic Consortium. It's about 20 minutes and focuses on emergent order and how markets solve the knowledge problem to create harmony. We also get into the current mess.

Outliers

Overflowing with outliers.

Cato reminder

Just a reminder that I'm speaking today (Monday), at noon at the Cato Institute, followed by lunch and a book signing. It's too late to register on line but you can just show up and register on the spot. There is no charge for the event.

Speaking at Cato on The Price of Everything

On December 1 at noon, I'll be speaking on The Price of Everything at Cato here in DC, with comments by Nick Gillespie. Followed by food. No charge, somehow. Register here before Friday the 28th.

Talk and book signing

I will be speaking about and signing copies of The Price of Everything later today (Tuesday, November 18th) between 5:30 and 6:30 at the GMU bookstore on the Fairfax campus.

Shameless Bragging and Self-Promotion

I thank Phil Murray for this very nice review of my book Globalization.

Five Dollar Book Club Update

I want to thank the following people who made donations to the Five Dollar Book Club.

Ken Bergren
William Dennis
Gerard Derricks
Bill Hesson
Joe Liemandt
Josiah Neeley
Patrick and Alicia Noone
Bailey Norwood
Nicole Perrin
Eric Sweeney
Hubertus and Katrin Van Der Vaart

I would like to make a small change in the informal rules of the Club. I will use the funds to purchase books that I will either give away or sell for $5 to people who I see as people with the potential to influence others. So yesterday, I sold 71 books to a group of high school economics teachers at a conference. When I sell the books, I will use the proceeds to make a donation to scholarships for graduate students at George Mason. I'd also like your permission to use the funds toward other forms of economic education as I see fit. I'm adding this last part because right now I have more funds than books to buy and give away.

These are informal rules. It's all on the honor system and I'll do the best I can to keep track of expenditures and activities without being a foundation.

If you sent me a check, I haven't cashed it yet. Nor have I sent out any books to those who were generous enough (thank you thank you). I wanted to make it clear what the new "rules" are and to make sure you're OK with that.  So if you're on the above list, let me know if the new rules are OK. Email me at Roberts, then the at sign, then gmu.edu.

If you want your check back, let me know.

The Club is now closed for the time being. I have plenty of money for a while.

Thanks again to all those who donated.

Video Interview on The Price of Everything

Here is a brief interview with me about The Price of Everything from Reason.tv.

Excellent Arrggguments

My colleague Pete Leeson has a new book on pirates -- the economic, social, and legal organization of pirate institutions, to be more precise.  Pete is an incredibly creative young scholar.  You can pre-order the book here from Princeton University Press (and you should do so; because it's not yet released, pirated editions are few!).  Here's the publisher's blurb:

Pack your cutlass and blunderbuss--it's time to go a-pirating! The Invisible Hook takes readers inside the wily world of late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century pirates. With swashbuckling irreverence and devilish wit, Peter Leeson uncovers the hidden economics behind pirates' notorious, entertaining, and sometimes downright shocking behavior. Why did pirates fly flags of Skull & Bones? Why did they create a "pirate code"? Were pirates really ferocious madmen? And what made them so successful? The Invisible Hook uses economics to examine these and other infamous aspects of piracy. Leeson argues that the pirate customs we know and love resulted from pirates responding rationally to prevailing economic conditions in the pursuit of profits.

The Invisible Hook looks at legendary pirate captains like Blackbeard, Black Bart Roberts, and Calico Jack Rackam, and shows how pirates' search for plunder led them to pioneer remarkable and forward-thinking practices. Pirates understood the advantages of constitutional democracy--a model they adopted more than fifty years before the United States did so. Pirates also initiated an early system of workers' compensation, regulated drinking and smoking, and in some cases practiced racial tolerance and equality. Leeson contends that pirates exemplified the virtues of vice--their self-seeking interests generated socially desirable effects and their greedy criminality secured social order. Pirates proved that anarchy could be organized. Revealing the democratic and economic forces propelling history's most colorful criminals, The Invisible Hook establishes pirates' trailblazing relevance to the contemporary world.

Who Cares?

Here's a letter that I sent two days ago to CNN.com:

8 October 2008

Editor, CNN.com

Dear Editor:

According to a recent poll, "55 percent of registered voters questioned say that Obama 'cares more about people like you' than Sen. John McCain" ("Poll: Obama seen as more compassionate than McCain," October 7).

What do such alleged 'cares' signify?  To win votes, politicians feign a god-like capacity to "feel your pain" and to be deeply concerned about persons they've never met.  Mature people, of course, don't take such poses seriously.

At the very least, voters should heed Charles Dickens's warning, issued in A Tale of Two Cities, against persons who deal in "second-hand cares" - that is, persons who are "principally occupied with the cares of other people."  This great novelist observed that "second-hand cares, like second-hand clothes, come easily off and on.”*

Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux

Dubner on The Price of Everything

Stephen Dubner reviews The Price of Everything at the Freakonomics blog.

The $5 book club

I'll be speaking later this month and early next at the University of Vermont (a debate with Bill McKibben on buying local), and to an AP teachers conference in Richmond, Virginia. I'd like to sell my book, The Price of Everything, at both places. But it's hard to sell books. So I'd like to subsidize them and sell them cheap, for $5. For the teachers, I'm tempted to just give them away, but making them pay $5 makes sure that they have some interest in reading it.

So I'm asking for your help. Join the $5 book club. Membership costs $10. For your $10, you have the pleasure of knowing that someone like a teacher of economics or a fan of Bill McKibben (probably the modal member of the audience at UV) will have a chance to read the book. Send $100 and I'll give you an autographed copy of the book. Send $200 and you'll also get an autographed copy of The Invisible Heart. Send $300 and you'll also get an autographed copy of The Choice. Send $500 and I'll send you a Hayek bobblehead. Kidding about the bobblehead but I'd like to have one of those someday.

The whole thing is informal. You trust me to use the money toward selling the book to audiences that are either highly skeptical or influential (teachers).

So if you're interested, send money to me at my GMU address:

Professor Russell Roberts
Department of Economics, MSN 3G4
George Mason University
4400 University Dr.
Fairfax, VA.  22030

Let me know if you want to be anonymous—I may post a membership list at some point. And if you send $100 or more, let me know where to send you an autographed copy. I'll keep everyone posted on the response.

Book Bench

A short interview with me at the New Yorker's blog, Book Bench.

In defense of used books

A reader commented asking if there was anything in The Price of Everything about buying books on Ebay. There isn't. But here is my defense of Amazon's decision a few years back to start listing used books for sale alongside new copies.

George Will on The Price of Everything

His column is here.

Chapter Two of The Price of Everything

Chapter Two of The Price of Everything is now available: HTML and PDF.

(Chapter One is here in HTML and PDF.)

Still waiting for the Kindle version. I'll let you know.

Do Markets Need Government?

Do markets need government?  One of my brilliant young GMU Econ colleagues, Pete Leeson, asks this important question in his contribution to this new volume of essays just published by London's indispensable Institute of Economic Affairs.

The Price of Everything on the Kindle

A number of people have asked about whether The Price of Everything will be on the Kindle. The answer is yes, but the date is unknown. My guess is soonish. Evidently it is in the hands of Amazon.

BTW, Chapter Two of the book will soon be available for free on the web along with Chapter One. I'll let you know when it's up.

The Course of Human Labor in Markets

Russ's new book, of course, is now out; a copy already graces a bookshelf in my home.  But for those of you who haven't yet read Russ's first book -- The Choice -- I urge you to do so ASAP.  It offers the best explanation of trade, and case against protectionism, penned since Bastiat last wrote more than 150 years ago.

A major theme of The Choice is that free trade -- or, more generally, producing any good or service with fewer and fewer resources (including human resources) -- releases resources (again and especially, including human resources) to produce other goods and services that would not otherwise be possible to produce.

And when human resources are released from many of the tasks that demanded it over the years (agriculture, manufacturing), human beings are able to find other occupations that generally are more fulfilling.  Although the span of time over which this emancipating process takes place is long enough to avoid detection and appreciation by those whose observation is only casual, stepping back and looking at our society today in comparison with that of 200 or even 50 years ago makes clear that this process of emancipating human labor from tedium is real and is responsible for much (I would say most) of what is fine and wonderful about our world today.

This comic-book account of robots replacing human labor makes the point.  (HT Ronald Hayden, who found this nice story at ColbyCosh.com)

First Chapter of The Price of Everything

The first chapter of The Price of Everything is now available online here in HTML or here in PDF.

The Price of Everything at Amazon

Just wanted to let Cafe patrons know that my new book, The Price of Everything, will be shipping later this week from Amazon. If you've already ordered a copy you probably received an email from Amazon saying the books not available, they don't know when it's coming in and so on. All of this despite the posted notice at Amazon that the book would be released on August 4. But my publisher tells me that it should have gone out to Amazon on the 4th, Amazon will receive it later this week, and will then start shipping.

For Kindle fans, I am told there will be a Kindle edition but I don't know when that will be available. Maybe the day the book is in stock at Amazon but maybe later. I'll keep you posted.

More Kindling

Just finished my first book on the Kindle—The Other, by David Guterson—and thought I'd share a few more thoughts on the Kindle experience.

I really enjoyed reading an entire book. Looked forward to picking it up. Found it a pleasure to use. Loved using the search function when the author mentioned a character in passing after a 200 page absence and I couldn't remember who the character was.

So far, there are only two things I don't like about the Kindle. The first is that it's another device in my life to keep charged. The list now includes computer, phone, camera, Kindle. But if you turn off the wireless, a charge on the Kindle lasts a very long time. As I am not using the Kindle for magazines or newspapers, I keep the wireless function off almost all of the time. The second is that you don't know what page you're on. There's a "location" measure and there's a visual representation at the bottom of the screen for how far along you are in the book. But it's not quite as satisfying as a page number. As I got near the end of The Other, I found myself wanting to flip ahead to see how close I was to the end.

Summer Reading

Because of family matters, this past Spring found me way behind in my reading (including reading books that I agreed to review -- a task which I'm catching up on now).  Here are three books that I'm especially eager to read this summer once my decks are all clear:

Stealing from Each Other: How the Welfare State Robs Americans of Money and Spirit, by Edgar K. Browning (2008).  Economists know Butch Browning for his excellent research in public finance.  This book promises to be well-researched, well-reasoned, and important.

The Dirty Dozen: How Twelve Supreme Court Cases Radically Expanded Government and Eroded Freedom, by Robert A. Levy & William Mellor (2008).  Bob Levy (a successful entrepreneur turned successful lawyer and inspiring policy analyst) and Chip Mellor (co-founder and president of the vital Institute for Justice) bring, I'm sure, passion and brilliance to their review of some of the Supremes' most unfortunate rulings.

Fooled By Randomness, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb (2005).  The praise this book has received is immense -- and not least from Russ Roberts.

Kindling

I broke down and bought a Kindle.

What I like after taking it on a four day trip:

Having a bunch of different stuff to read that takes up very little space.

The act of reading on it. It's surprisingly pleasant. I find myself reading quickly.

How relatively easy it is to take notes.

How incredibly easy it is to mark a passage

The ability to download a bunch of samples to read before you buy and buying the one you're in the mood to read.

Buying books that don't clutter my house. I have a lot of books already.

What I don't like

Not having books around the house I've read to pick up and share with my family and friends

Reading the Sunday New York Times. It's just not as much fun. Not even close. Didn't really even want to read it. I'd really have to want to read a particular article.

Having to turn it off when the plane takes off or lands.

It's a weird thought to think that this might be the future of reading. It's possible that it might be. It would be sad to lose the opportunity to look at a shelf of books and figure out what I want to read next or what I want to share with my kids. But it might be worth it if it means you can carry around a few thousand books with you all the time which is the way it's heading.

The Real Life of Low Carbon-Footprint Locovores

The late William Manchester's 1992 book A World Lit Only By Fire provides a well-paced and vivid look at life in late-medieval and renaissance Europe.  For example, consider his description of the homes and some common experiences of peasants (pp. 52-54):

Lying at the end of a narrow, muddy lane, his rambling edifice of thatch, wattles, mud, and dirty brown wood was almost obscured by a towering dung heap in what, without it, would have been the front yard.  The building was large, for it was more than a dwelling.  Beneath its sagging roof were a pigpen, a henhouse, cattle sheds, corncribs, straw and hay, and, last and least, the family's apartment, actually a single room whose walls and timbers were coated with soot.  According to Erasmus, who examined such huts, "almost all the floors are of clay and rushes from the marshes, so carelessly renewed that the foundation sometimes remains for twenty years, harboring, there below, spittle and vomit and wine of dogs and men, beer...remnants of fishes, and other filth unnameable.  Hence, with the change of weather, a vapor exhales which in my judgment is far from wholesome."

The centerpiece of the room was a gigantic bedstead, piled high with straw pallets, all seething with vermin.  Everyone slept there, regardless of age or gender -- grandparents, parents, children, grandchildren, and hens and pigs -- and if a couple chose to enjoy intimacy, the others were aware of every movement.  In summer they could even watch.....

If this familial situation seems primitive, it should be borne in mind that these were prosperous peasants.  Not all of their neighbors were so lucky.  Some lived in tiny cabins of crossed laths, stuffed with grass or straw, inadequately shielded from rain, snow, and wind.  They lacked even a chimney; smoke from the cabin's fire left through a small hole in the thatched roof -- where, unsurprisingly, fires frequently broke out.  These homes were without glass windows or shutters; in a storm, or in frigid weather, openings in the walls could only be stuffed with straw, rags -- whatever was handy....

Typically, three years of harvests could be expected for one year of famine.  The years of hunger were terrible.  The peasants might be forced to sell all they owned, including their pitifully inadequate clothing, and be reduced to nudity in all seasons.  In the hardest times they devoured bark, roots, grass; even white clay.  Cannibalism was not unknown.  Strangers and travelers were waylaid and killed to be eaten, and there are tales of gallows being torn down -- as many as twenty bodies would hang from a single scaffold -- by men frantic to eat the warm flesh raw [original emphasis].

Schumpeter on Politicians

I am thoroughly enjoying Prophet of Innovation, Thomas McCraw's new biography of Joseph Schumpeter.  Reading it reminds me of a long-harbored desire of mine to do a blog-post filled with many of the stunningly brilliant insights from Part II ("Can Capitalism Survive?") of Schumpeter's remarkable 1942 book Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy.  (I first read this book as an undergraduate, a happy fact that forever immunized me against taking textbook theories of competition too seriously.)  I'll do that blog post soon.  For now, though, I content myself with sharing these two quotations that McCraw reports (on page 405 of his biography) are from the mid-1940s Schumpeter's diary:

Politicians are like bad horsemen who are so preoccupied with keeping in the saddle that they can't bother about where they go.

And

A statesman is the criminal who works with phrases instead of with the burglar’s jimmy.

(Don't miss Russ's podcast with Thomas McCraw.)

The Price of Everything at Amazon

My new book, The Price of Everything: A Parable of Possibility and Prosperity is now available for pre-order at Amazon for the lovely low price of $16.47 in hardcover. Scheduled arrival is August 4. Here's the blurb:

Stanford University student and Cuban American tennis prodigy Ramon Fernandez is outraged when a nearby mega-store hikes its prices the night of an earthquake. He crosses paths with provost and economics professor Ruth Lieber when he plans a campus protest against the price-gouging retailer--which is also a major donor to the university. Ruth begins a dialogue with Ramon about prices, prosperity, and innovation and their role in our daily lives. Is Ruth trying to limit the damage from Ramon's protest? Or does she have something altogether different in mind?

As Ramon is thrust into the national spotlight by events beyond the Stanford campus, he learns there's more to price hikes than meets the eye, and he is forced to reconsider everything he thought he knew. What is the source of America's high standard of living? What drives entrepreneurs and innovation? What upholds the hidden order that allows us to choose our careers and pursue our passions with so little conflict? How does economic order emerge without anyone being in charge? Ruth gives Ramon and the reader a new appreciation for how our economy works and the wondrous role that the price of everything plays in everyday life.

The Price of Everything is a captivating story about economic growth and the unseen forces that create and sustain economic harmony all around us.

    Here are the back cover quotes:

Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of "The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable" : A remarkable use of parables and dialogues to convey economic intuitions. This should be mandatory reading for anyone who wants to understand this branch of applied philosophy we call economics.

Vernon Smith, Nobel Prize-winning economist : This is a great story about human, social, and economic betterment brought about by the forces of spontaneous coordination. It's also about justice and there's a warm ending. Read and enjoy.

Paul Romer, Stanford University : The Price of Everything illuminates the astonishing economic world we live in. This book could change your life--reading it will give you a sense of wonder about the everyday marvels that are all around us.

Deirdre N. McCloskey, author of "The Bourgeois Virtues" : The Price of Everything is sensationally good fiction and sensationally good economics.

   

I hope you like it.

Blowing My Own Horn (or Kazoo)

What you'll get in return for paying $44 for my book Globalization looks better and better (at least according to this short review)!

Even More Consumer Surplus!

Happily I inform you that Amazon.com just cut the price it charges for my book Globalization by a whopping 20 percent -- from $55 to $44!!

While a bargain at any price, you'll now want to buy countless copies for yourself, loved ones, friends, neighbors, your mailman, and pets.

A Review of Globalization

I've always admired the judgment and insight regularly displayed by John Tamny over at RealClearMarkets.  Proof that my admiration is well-placed is supplied today by John's review of my book Globalization.

Misbehaving Amazon? Or Misbehaving State?

In his 2002 book Creative Destruction, Tyler Cowen explains "How Globalization is Changing the World's Cultures" -- for the better.

The government of France, however, seems to be intent on slowing this process of improvement for its citizens.  Check out this post by Nate Anderson over at Ars Technica (HT Konstantin Medvedovsky):

Did you hear the one about Amazon? It offered free shipping in France, got sued for it by the French Booksellers' Union, and lost. Now it's choosing to pay €1,000 a day rather than follow the court's order. Ba-da-bing!

No, it's not funny, but that's because it's not a joke. The Tribunal de Grande Instance (a French appeals court) in Versailles ruled back in December that Amazon was violating the country's 1981 Lang law with its free shipping offer. That law forbids booksellers from offering discounts of more than 5 percent off the list price, and Amazon was found to be exceeding that discount when the free shipping was factored in.

Thwarting the ability of ordinary French citizens to get good deals on books makes books more difficult for French citizens to get.  France's cultural richness is less than it would otherwise be.

Some commentors to this post take issue with identifying firms protected by the government from competition as disreputable.  I'm in the camp whose members - finding nothing especially magical, glorious, magnanimous, informed, or trustworthy about the state or political actions - hold that hiring the state to forcibly stop people from patronizing competitors at mutually agreeable prices is no different morally than hiring a street gang or your brother-in-law to do the same.

George MacDonald Fraser, RIP

George MacDonald Fraser, author of one of my favorite series of novels, died yesterday.  (HT Beth Hoffman)

In the early 1990s, my friend George Selgin introduced me to Fraser's Flashman novels.  I read the first one and was hooked.  They're enormously entertaining and filled with lots of sound military history.