Thomas E. Woods Jr.'s Blog

My Liberty Classroom now features an instantly downloadable course in Austrian economics, taught by the great Jeffrey Herbener, senior fellow of the Ludwig von Mises Institute. As with all our courses, it’s available in audio or video format, according to your preference. Here’s what it looks like:

I. Scope and Method of Economics

Economics

Method of Economics

Scope of Economics: Human Action

II. Laws of Personal Action

Implications of Human Action

Laws of Utility

The Law of Returns

Capital Formation

III. Laws of Voluntary, Interpersonal Action

Voluntary Exchange

The Division of Labor

The Unhampered Market Economy

Money

Prices of Consumer Goods

Prices of Producer Goods

Economic Calculation

Profit and Production Decisions

Equity and Investment Decisions

The Capital Structure

Competition and Monopoly

The Time Market: The Rate of Interest

Income: Sources and Disbursements

The Money Market: The Purchasing Power of Money

Bond Markets

Stock Markets

Economic Progress

IV. Laws of Involuntary, Interpersonal Action

Booms and Busts

Money and Banking

Monetary Policy: Monetary Inflation and Credit Expansion

The Business Cycle

Fiscal Policy

Interventionism: Price Controls

Interventionism: Product Controls

The Mixed Economy

The Command Economy: Socialism and Fascism

Professor Herbener will also be joining our members on June 20 for a live video Q&A.

There are many other benefits of membership, to be sure, but since I myself would give my right arm to study under Professor Herbener, this course alone makes the site irresistible. See you there!

In June and July, that is.

June 6: Madrid, Spain, Fundación Rafael del Pino

June 8: Ft. Worth, Texas, Texas GOP Convention (book signing)

June 9: Ft. Worth, Texas, Texas LP Convention

June 11 (tentative): Topeka, Kansas, Federalist Society event (details to come)

June 15: Atlanta, Georgia, Foundation for Economic Education history seminar

July 12-14: Las Vegas, Nevada, FreedomFest (the Woods luncheon is on the 13th; I’ll be on a couple of panels throughout the event as well)

July 22-28: Auburn, Alabama, ‘Mises University’ summer instructional program in economics

Hope to see you at one of these!

Stefan Molyneux and I were interviewed over the weekend on the Valerie Sargent Martin Show. A nice discussion ensued. Warning: unapproved, even radical ideas were promoted.

This almost never happens. People have a vested interest in the paradigm in which they’re trained. Jeff Herbener, department chairman of economics at Grove City College (where the great Hans Sennholz taught), was honest enough to admit the flaws in what he had been taught:

I was trained entirely in the mathematical­/neoclassical tradition at Oklahoma State. Economics attracted me because it seemed to deal with fundamental and interesting questions. In this, it was unlike political science, which seemed to me to be steeped in irrelevant questions like, “what does the public think about this or that,” and superficial techniques like surveys. Even bad economics is leagues above that in sophistication. But my professors were all conventional economists, would-be planners working from one or another Keynesian paradigm. I wrote a highly mathematical dissertation on money demand that used all the latest econometric techniques. I did what everyone else was doing, and my only goal was to do it better.

I didn’t know enough to be dissatisfied with the neoclassical paradigm. I knew nothing about the Austrian School except for a brief exposure to the Böhm-Bawerkian structure of production in a class on capital theory. At the same time, I retained my interest in larger problems and deeper questions, which I owe to my father’s own philosophical turn of mind.

After getting out of graduate school, I took my first teaching position at Pittsburg State University. I began to read Hayek, and moved on to Mises and Rothbard and the rest of the tradition. They offered a much more satisfying and coherent way of looking at economic questions. This research has occupied me since.

More and more economists sense that their techniques and studies are merely arcane or even trivial. This realization provides an opening for the Austrian School. I’m surprised when I’m at mainstream conferences, or read American Economist. Many more people are showing interest in alternative ways of doing economics. If our work is good, we’ll eventually win these people over, and win the battle of ideas.

Professor Herbener’s whole interview is very much worth reading.

And Professor Herbener, who knows the neoclassical paradigm inside and out, is teaching our Austrian economics course at Liberty Classroom. I am also soliciting from him a course to be called “Keynes: His System and Its Fallacies.” I hope you’ll consider joining us.

Check out this one-minute video about my friend Glenn Horowitz, a talented writer and overall good guy. He could use a hand. Can we extend him one?

Now head over to GetGlennMobile.com.

A fantastic story about how someone’s life improved dramatically after hearing the Primal Blueprint‘s Mark Sisson interviewed on the Peter Schiff Show, during one of my guest-hosting stints.

It’s economist Bob Murphy’s birthday today. A fan sent him this:

If you are missing the reference, you need to watch Interview with a Zombie. (And also know that Bob has refuted Krugman more than all other economists combined.)

I just started a Facebook page for my Liberty Classroom. Whether you’re a member or just a well-wisher, I’d be very pleased if you ‘liked’ the page.

One other thing: this course in Austrian economics will be downloadable by members in the coming weeks. They won’t be paying extra for it, since ours is a one-fee-gets-you-absolutely-everything-we-have model. Be a part of it!

Watch economist Robert Murphy take apart Paul Krugman. Oh, wait, you can also see him do it here. And here. And here he hits another Keynesian. In this piece, Murphy writes: “In this short commentary, Krugman has outdone himself. He manages to blend in a combination of (a) blatant, demonstrable falsehood, (b) misleading innuendo, (c) attacks on the motivations of those who disagree with him, and to top it off (d) a hypocritical implied criticism of the very policies he himself supported.” And here Murphy smacks down Krugman on the Fed and employment data.

And that’s just this week.

Now check out KrugmanDebate.com.

Remember that scene in Annie Hall where Woody Allen is standing in front of some guy who’s pontificating about Marshall McLuhan, and Allen’s character is able to produce Marshall McLuhan himself, who in turn denounces the guy as an ignoramus? In case you don’t, give me a minute of your time:

Here’s why this is relevant. The other day I wrote about $17,000 helicopter drip pans being purchased by the Pentagon, and I noted that the company that manufactures them just happened to be a major donor to the congressman who inserted this earmark into a spending bill.

Missing the whole point, an indignant ex-soldier in the comments section couldn’t believe I might criticize government employees, and insisted on the virtues of ordinary soldiers (who have nothing to do with these purchase decisions in any event, so his point is a little obscure). He then said, “If that drip pan can be gotten for cheaper then either someone in the army made an honest mistake or that drip pan is really needed.” I was then lectured on drip pans, and grilled on whether I knew anything about helicopter maintenance and repair:

do you know ANYTHING about helicopter maintenance?  have you even ever been close to one?

how about you go and talk to a real helicopter maintenance crew and ask them about this.  or how about you join the national guard as a helicopter mechanic and then we can talk.  until then i think its best if you leave it to the command structure (who know a thing or two about helicopters) to decide what the army needs or doesn’t.

And then came the Woody Allen/Marshall McLuhan moment, in the comment that followed, from dave_in_sotex:

8 years active duty Army 67N Utility Helicopter Repairman. 20+ years working for Cessna Aircraft Company after I got out. You know what a drip pan is, Greg? It’s a large pan you slide under an aircraft while it’s parked to keep oil or hydraulic fluid from “dripping” on the hangar floor. Sound like it’s worth 17k each to keep someone from having to wipe some drops off the floor?

That was the last we heard of our critic.