DOCSLIB.ORG

March 2014 This Month’S Features

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text

Load more

March•2014 PULSE ON THE MARKET Whoa-oh China Gold Discreet Yellen BUILDING THE 10% Bank of England Shreds Ah, Venice Napolitano Judges Lincoln LMR Page 5 DO LIFE INSURERS KEEP CASH VALUES AFTER DEATH? by Robert P. Murphy Page 8 EXPLODING ENRON AND OTHER ENERGY MYTHS INTERVIEW WITH ROBERT L. BRADLEY, JR. Page 25 THE INFINITE BANKING INSTITUTE: OUR FIRST ANNIVERSARY by L. Carlos Lara Page 17 LARA-MURPHY REPORT 2 LMR MARCH 2014 THIS MONTH’S Features 178 25 DO LIFE INSURERS THE IBI: OUR FIRST EXPLODING ENRON KEEP CASH VALUES ANNIVERSARY AND other AFTER death? BY L. Carlos Lara ENERGY MYTHS BY Robert P. Murphy Lara wishes congrats but the best is Interview yet to come. Murphy tackles the common Robert Bradley is one of the world’s objection that life insurance leading free-market energy economists. companies keep your cash value The future is bright, if government when you die. would get out of the way. IN EVERY ISSUE 4 5 31 Dear Readers Economic Deep End One More Thing LARA-MURPHY Report PULSE ON THE MARKET EVENTS AND Time to mark your calendar for this Whoa-oh China Gold • Discreet ENGAGEMENTS year’s Night of Clarity! Yellen • Bank of England Shreds Learn more in person from Lara, • Ah, Venice • Napolitano Judges Murphy, and other Austrian economists, Lincoln at these upcoming appearances. Overview 3 LMR SEPTEMBER 2010 ABOUT LARA & MURPHY L. CARLOS LARA manages a consulting firm specializing in corporate trust services, business consulting and L. Carlos Lara debtor-creditor relations. The LMREditor in Chief firm’s primary service is working Dr. Robert P. Murphy with companies Executive Editor in financial crisis. Serving business Anne B. Lara Managing Editor clients nationwide over a period of three decades, these engagements have involved companies in Stephanie Long Design Director most major industries including, manufacturing, distribution and retail. Lara incorporated his CUSTOMER SERVICE consulting company in 1976 and is headquartered In order to subscribe to LMR, visit: in Nashville, Tennessee. www.usatrustonline.com/store He married Anne H. Browning in 1970. and click on subscriptions. Together they have three children and five To update your account information please visit the same grandchildren. online store, login and manage your account. For questions or comments concerning LMR, its articles or anything about the publication other than advertising please DR. ROBERT P. “BOB” email: [email protected] MURPHY received his Ph.D. in economics For questions or comments concerning LMR advertising please from New York email: [email protected] University. After READERS STATUS: LMR staff and its contributors warrant and represent that they are not teaching for three “brokers” or to be deemed as “broker-dealers,” as such terms are defined in the years at Hillsdale Securities act of 1933, as amended, or an ”insurance company,” or “bank.” College, Murphy LEGAL, TAX, ACCOUNTING OR INVESTMENT ADVICE: LMR staff and its contributors are not rendering legal, tax, accounting, or investment advice. All exhibits left academia to in this book are solely for illustration purposes, but under no circumstances shall work for Arthur the reader construe these as rendering legal, tax, accounting or investment advice. Laffer’s investment DISCLAIMER & LIMITATION OF LIABILITY: The views expressed in LMR concerning finance, banking, insurance, financial advice and any other area are firm. Murphy that of the editors, writers, interviewee subjects and other associated persons as now runs his own indicated. LMR staff, contributors and anyone who materially contributes information hereby disclaim any and all warranties, express, or implied, including merchantability consulting business or fitness for a particular purpose and make no representation or warranty of the certainty that any particular result will be achieved. In no event will the contributors, and maintains an economics blog at editors, their employees or associated persons, or agents be liable to the reader, or ConsultingByRPM.com. He is the author it’s Agents for any causes of action of any kind whether or not the reader has been of several economics books for the layperson, advised of the possibility of such damage. LICENSING & REPRINTS: LMR is produced and distributed primarily through the including The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Great internet with limited numbers of printings. It is illegal to redistribute for sale or for Depression and the New Deal (Regnery, 2009). free electronically or otherwise any of the content without the expressed written consent of the principle parties at United Services & Trust Corporation. The only legal Murphy is Senior Economist at the Institute audience is the subscriber. Printing LMR content for offline reading for personal use for Energy Research, and a Research Fellow with by subscribers to said content is the only permissible printing without express written consent. Photo’s are from various public domain sources unless otherwise noted. the Independent Institute. He lives in Nashville, TN. 4 LMR MARCHMARCH 2014 “Whether we like it or not, it is a fact that economics cannot remain an esoteric branch of knowledge accessible only to small groups of scholars and specialists. Economics deals with society’s fundamental problems; it concerns everyone and belongs to all. It is the main and proper study of every citizen.” —Ludwig von Mises, Human Action Virtually every social problem today that ostensibly justifies further government intervention into our private affairs, has at its root an economic foundation. Beyond the obvious issues such as the Fed’s “quantitative easing” programs, proposals to raise the minimum wage, and of course ObamaCare, even things like the situation in Ukraine—where cynics suspect energy has more to do with it than political self-determination—require knowledge of economic science. For another example, economists are the ones most qualified to describe why gang violence (think Al Capone) flourished under alcohol Prohibition; this is not something historians can really explain, unless we mean historians who have studied economics. So we see that like it or not, it is vital that the public grasps at least a basic understanding of economic theory, and knows how to apply these concepts to major policy issues of the day. Only an educated public will be able to see through the fog of deceptive promises spun by our political leaders and talking heads in the media. We here at the Lara-Murphy Report have adopted the motto of “Building the 10 Percent.” It is our firm belief that if we can just educate and inspire a small segment of the population, then we can roll back the tide of mushrooming government meddling in our lives and pocketbooks. To this end, we hold an annual event in downtown Nashville entitled The Night of Clarity. The Night of Clarity is the perfect embodiment in conference form of everything we do here at the Lara- Murphy Report. It is held over the course of two days. On the first day (Friday), we have short and riveting talks from the world’s leading scholars and orators in Austrian economics to lay out the problem with our financial system and government. Then on Saturday we have a workshop in which experts lay out the solution as described by Nelson Nash’s Infinite Banking Concept. For a memorial video capturing the highlights from the 2013 Night of Clarity (which featured Ron Paul as the headliner) see: http://tinyurl.com/nyju6dw This year the Night of Clarity will feature former Reagan budget director and author of the NYT bestseller The Great Deformation David Stockman as the headliner. It will be held August 15-16, 2014 so mark your calendars. In upcoming issues of the LMR we will spell out all of the exciting details, so be watching! Yours truly, Carlos and Bob Lara-Murphy Report 5 LMR MARCHMARCH 2014 PULSE ON THE MARKET RECENT DEVELOPMENTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST TO READERS OF THE LARA-MURPHY REPORt… Whoa-oh China Gold SPECulatION OF GOLD BACKING FOR CHINESE CURRENCY Freya Beamish recently published a note for clients of Lombard Street Research which speculated that the Chinese authorities may be preparing to back their currency with their growing gold reserves. It might be helpful here to review some history: Starting in 1995, the government of China pegged the yuan to the USD in a pretty tight range (about 8.3 yuan to the dollar), in which it stayed up through May 2005, at which point the authorities began letting the yuan appreciate against the dollar. (Since then, the yuan has strengthened to 6.1 against the dollar, meaning the dollar has lost more than 25% of its value against the Chinese currency in the last nine years.) The entire episode is an alarming microcosm of what seems to be playing out on the world stage more generally: China had originally pegged the yuan to the USD because it was seen as a sign of stability, a solid anchor. But China eventually had to let the yuan float and appreciate against the dollar, lest the Federal Reserve’s inflationary policies during the housing bubble years bring the yuan down with it. If the Chinese authorities take an even bolder step by linking their currency to something much more reliable—such as gold or a broader basket of physical commodities—then it would be “game over” for the USD as the world’s reserve currency. Of the factors delaying such a move, is surely the fact that the Chinese possess (as of January 2014) $1.3 trillion in U.S. government Treasury securities. Any sudden action that crashed the dollar in the foreign exchange markets would also wreck the Chinese bond portfolio, which is why they have to play the long game. Pulse on the Market 6 LMR MMARCHARCH 2014 PULSE ON THE MARKET RECENT DEVELOPMENTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST TO READERS OF THE LARA-MURPHY REPORt… Discreet Yellen YELLEN FED SIGNALS POLICY UNCertaINTY The markets eagerly awaited the first announcement from the Federal Reserve after Janet Yellen had assumed the chair.
Recommended publications
  • Before the Revolution

    Before the Revolution

    Hell_9780385513999_4p_01_r1.e.qxp 8/25/09 10:04 AM Page 1 ONE BEFORE THE REVOLUTION 1905 – 1917 y If a life can have a theme song, and I believe every worthwhile one has, mine is a religion, an obsession, or a mania or all of these expressed in one word: individualism. I was born with that obsession and have never seen and do not know now a cause more worthy, more misunder- stood, more seemingly hopeless and more tragically needed. Call it fate or irony, but I was born, of all countries on earth, in the one least suit- able for a fanatic of individualism, Russia. —Autobiographical Sketch, 1936 hen the fierce and extraordinary Ayn Rand was fifty- two years old, about to become world famous, and more than thirty years re- moved from her birthplace in Russia, she summed up the meaning Wof her elaborate, invented, cerebral world this way: “My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute.” It was a world in which no dictator, no deity, and no well- meaning sense of duty would ever take away the moral right of the gifted individual—Ayn Rand—to live according to her own high- wattage lights. This was not the world she was born into. Ayn Rand was born Alissa Zinovievna Rosenbaum, a Russian Jew, on February, 2, 1905, in St. Peters- Hell_9780385513999_4p_01_r1.e.qxp 8/25/09 10:04 AM Page 2 2 AYN RAND burg, then the capital city of the most anti- Semitic and politically di- vided nation on the European continent.
  • Vrijbrief 1998/2

    Vrijbrief 1998/2

    Protectionisme: bescherming van de consument tegen lage prijzen de Vrijbrief Democratie: Zin of Onzin? Stem Niet! De Utopische Verleiding: plaag van deze eeuw Ongelode benzine: de Feiten 1998/2 van de Redactie LIJFSBEHOUD De overheid biedt u 'de kans van uw leven'. U kunt nu laten regi- streren dat u uw kostbaarste bezit wilt weggeven. ledere Nederlan- der van 18 jaar en ouder heeft hiervoor een formulier thuisgestuurd gekregen: wordt orgaandonor en geeft gul! Maar de verkoop van organen blijft verboden. In Nederland heerst de consensus dat geld verdienen aan een nier of lever onethisch is. Bij leven mag u slechts beslissen of u al dan niet delen van uw li- chaam, na uw dood, gratis wilt afstaan aan anderen. Meer mag niet; het recht te beschikken over eigen lijf en leden eindigt bij overlij- den. In jeugdige overmoed besloten een vriend en ik eens dat wij beiden eetbaar waren. Christus had ons het goede voorbeeld gegeven met zijn 'neemt en eet dit lichaam'. En in Robert Heinleins voortreffelij- ke science-fiction roman Stranger In A Strange Land genoten de vrienden van hoofdpersoon Valentine Michael Smith smakelijk na van zijn dood. Er moest wel een snufje zout bij. Kannibalisme leek ons pas misdadig als iemand tegen zijn zin werd opgegeten. Op uit een schoolschrift gescheurde blaadjes schreven we dat ieders li- chaam, na overlijden, eigendom werd van de langstlevende. Voor hem om naar goeddunken over te beschikken. Orgaandonatie stond toen nog niet zo in de belangstelling en we waren jong. Anders hadden we ongetwijfeld bedacht dat de langstlevende het lichaam van de ander ook te gelde zou kunnen maken.
  • The Freeman 1995

    The Freeman 1995

    IDEAS ON LIBERTY 4 Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973): A Prophet Without Honor in CONTENTS His Own Land by Bettina Bien Greaves JANUARY The great economist's early years. 1995 9 Invasion of the Mind Snatchers by Nelson Hultberg VOL. 45 The insidious collectivist ideological movement at work in America. NO.1 13 Tacit Consent: A Quiet Tyranny by Bowen H. Greenwood The views of John Locke and John Rawls. 18 Ideas and Consequences-How Important Is Your Vote? by Lawrence W. Reed Some thoughts on suffrage and democracy. 20 Private Property Ownership by Albert R. Bellerue Recovering lost sticks in the bundle of rights. 23 Private Property and Government Under the Constitution by Gary M. Pecquet Where have all our property rights gone? 33 A Matter of Principle-The Second American Revolution? by Robert James Bidinotto Analyzing the November mid-term elections. 35 The First Atomic Age: A Failure of Socialism by Rodney Adams How the "socialized atom" superseded the "entrepreneurial atom." 40 Nuclear Power: Our Best Option by Mike Oliver and John Hospers Common sense about energy issues. 46 The Immorality of Social Security by John Attarian A disingenuous, flawed system faces bankruptcy. 51 Employer Mandates: A Threat to Employees by David R. Henderson When government requires employment benefits, workers lose. 54 Economics on Trial-European Unemployment: The Age of Ignorance, Part II by Mark Skousen A mystery is not so mysterious after all. 56 Book Reviews Daniel B. Klein reviews Second Thoughts: Myths and Morals of U.S. Economic History, edited by Donald N. McCloskey; Ain't Nobody's Business If You Do: The Absurdity ofConsensual Crimes in a Free Society by Peter McWilliams, reviewed by Doug Bandow; The Fall of the Ivory Tower: Government Funding, Corruption, and the Bankrupting ofHigher Education by George Roche, reviewed by Steven Yates; Your Doctor Is Not In: Healthy Skepticism About National Health Care by Jane M.
  • Libertarianism

    Libertarianism

    Piero Vernaglione Libertarianism Index 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................... 2 2. Self-ownership .......................................................................................................................................... 3 3. Property on tangible things ....................................................................................................................... 7 4. Non-aggression principle ........................................................................................................................ 11 5. Permissible actions .................................................................................................................................. 16 6. Liberty as property .................................................................................................................................. 19 7. Other implications of the theory ............................................................................................................. 22 Bibliography................................................................................................................................................ 31 Cite this essay as: P. Vernaglione, Libertarianism, in Rothbardiana, https://www.rothbard.it/teoria/libertarianism.pdf, May 31st, 2020. 2 Il libertarismo 1. Introduction Libertarianism1 is a political philosophy, therefore its field of investigation is the examination of
  • The Freeman 1999

    The Freeman 1999

    Ideas On: Liberty ~ June 1999 Vol. 49, No.6 8 The Professionalization of Parenthood by Susan Orr 11 Children's Real Enemy by John Hood 16 The Second Amendment in the Light of American Republicanism by Joseph R. Stromberg 23 The Reserve Requirement Debacle of 1935-1938 by Richard H Timberlake 130 The Great Gold Robbery by James Bovard 125 Market-Share Sophisms by Christopher Mayer 39 The Market and Political Freedom by John Marangos 42 Against the Tide: The Life of Francis W. Hirst by Mark Brady 48 Educational Savior? by Daniel Hager 4 THOUGHTS on FREEDOM-Government Is No God by Donald J. Boudreaux 21 IDEAS and CONSEQUENCES-A Tax Is Not a User Fee! by Lawrence W Reed 33 POTOMAC PRINCIPLES-Balkans Bungling: Why Only Congress Can Declare War by Doug Bandow 37 PERIPATETICS-The Permanent War by Sheldon Richman 146 ECONOMIC NOTIONS-Private Property and Opportunity Costs by Dwight R. Lee 52 ECONOMICS on TRIAL-New Possibilities for Our Grandchildren by Mark Skousen 63 THE PURSUIT of HAPPINESS-Nothing's Free by Russell Roberts 2 Perspective-When Bullies Take Power by Sheldon Richman 6 Workers Exploited? It Just Ain't So! by Donald J. Boudreaux 51 Capital Letters: Does Survival Trump Morality? 54 Book Reviews A Life of One's Own: Individual Rights and the Welfare State by David Kelley, reviewed by Ellen Frankel Paul; Mugwumps: Public Moralists of the Gilded Age by David M. Tucker, reviewed by Burton Folsom; Who Killed Homer? The Demise of Classical Education and the Recovery of Greek Wisdom by Victor Davis Hanson and John Heath, reviewed by Fred D.
  • BUILDING BLOCKS for Liberty

    BUILDING BLOCKS for Liberty

    BUILDING BLOCKS FOR Liberty BUILDING BLOCKS FOR Liberty Critical Essays by Walter Block Edited by Iulian Tãnase and Bogdan Glãvan Foreword by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. LvMI MISES INSTITUTE © Walter Block 2006 © Libertas Publishing 2006 First hardcover edition published in 2006 by Libertas Publishing, Bucharest, Romania (www.libertaspublishing.com). First English edition © 2010 by the Ludwig von Mises Institute and published under the Creative Commons Attribution License 3.0. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0/ Ludwig von Mises Institute 518 West Magnolia Avenue Auburn, Alabama 36832 mises.org ISBN: 978-1-933550-91-6 Table of Contents Acknowledgements . .vii Foreword by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. ix Introduction . xi Part One: Economics. .1 1. On Property and Exploitation . .3 2. Toward a Universal Libertarian Theory of Gun (Weapon) Control: A Spatial and Geographical Analysis. .17 3. Environmentalism and Economic Freedom: The Case for Private Property Rights . .31 4. Enterprising Education: Doing Away with the Public School System. .53 5. Labor Relations, Unions and Collective Bargaining: A Political Economic Analysis . .69 6. Is There a Right to Unionize? . .97 7. Free Market Transportation: Denationalizing the Roads . .101 8. Public Goods and Externalities: The Case of Roads . .141 9. The Gold Standard: A Critique of Friedman, Mundell, Hayek and Greenspan . 191 v vi Building Blocks for Liberty Part Two: Human Rights . .215 10. The Nonaggression Axiom of Libertarianism . .217 11. Libertarianism, Positive Obligations and Property Abandonment: Children’s Rights . .221 12. Social Justice . .235 13. Discrimination: An Interdisciplinary Analysis. .239 14. A Libertarian Case for Free Immigration. .263 15. Secession . .285 16.
  • Unity and Integration in Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged

    Unity and Integration in Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged

    LIBERTARIAN PAPERS VOL. 3, ART. NO. 5 (2011) UNITY AND INTEGRATION IN AYN RAND’S ATLAS SHRUGGED EDWARD W. YOUNKINS* IN ATLAS SHRUGGED (1957), AYN RAND PRESENTS her original, brilliant, and controversial philosophy of Objectivism in dramatized form.1 More than a great novel, it expounds a radically new philosophy with amazing clarity. Atlas Shrugged presents an integrated and all-embracing perspective of man and man’s relationship to the world and manifests the essentials of an entire philosophical system—metaphysics, epistemology, politics, and ethics. Atlas Shrugged embodies Objectivism in the actions of the story’s heroes. Leonard Peikoff (2004) explains that the most extraordinary quality of Atlas Shrugged is its integration. Ayn Rand understood that everything that is included in a novel affects that novel. The unity of a novel depends upon the necessary causal and logical connections among its many aspects. It follows *Edward W. Younkins ([email protected]) is Professor of Accountancy and Business Administration in the Department of Business at Wheeling Jesuit University in West Virginia. Acknowledgments: Several people have contributed importantly to this article by reading and commenting on it. I am grateful to the following individuals for their useful observations and suggestions: Roger Bissell, Walter Block, Douglas J. Den Uyl, Mimi Gladstein, Steven Horowitz, Spencer MacCallum, Russell Madden, Douglas B. Rasmussen, Jeff Riggenbach, Peter Saint-Andre, Chris Matthew Sciabarra, Larry Sechrest, and Gennady Stolyarov. CITE THIS ARTICLE AS: Edward W. Younkins, “Unity and Integration in Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged,” Libertarian Papers 3, 5 (2011). ONLINE AT: libertarianpapers.org. THIS ARTICLE IS subject to a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License (creativecommons.org/licenses).
  • The Peikovian Doctrine of the Arbitrary Assertion Robert L. Campbell

    The Peikovian Doctrine of the Arbitrary Assertion Robert L. Campbell

    Epistemology The Peikovian Doctrine of the Arbitrary Assertion Robert L. Campbell Though still barely known outside of Randian circles, the doctrine of the arbitrary assertion has come to occupy a prominent place in Objectivist epistemology. Ayn Rand’s disciple Leonard Peikoff is responsible for its only detailed presentation in print.1 The doctrine raises several philosophical questions. Does an epistemology firmly grounded in facts about human mental function- ing, as Rand’s claims to be, require a notion of the arbitrary? Is Peikoff’s notion of an arbitrary assertion clear? Does the concept have the scope of application that Peikoff stakes out for it? Should arbitrary assertions all be handled as Peikoff prescribes? Are the arguments for the doctrine sound? These questions bear on the nature and quality of Peikoff’s work as a philosopher, and on the viability of Objectivism construed as a closed system.2 Arbitrariness in OPAR The doctrine of the arbitrary assertion gets its first (and, so far, its only) full explication in print in Peikoff’s opus Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (hereinafter OPAR).3 In the chapter on Reason (Peikoff 1993, 152–86), one of the five sections is titled “The Arbitrary as Neither True Nor False” (163–71); there is some further material on arbitrary assertions in the following section on “Contex- tual Certainty” (171–82).4 Peikoff contrasts rationality with “emotion- alism” (162): will thinking that respects facts and evidence prevail, or will it be feelings to which facts and evidence must conform? It is against this backdrop that “the arbitrary” makes its appearance: “Claims based on emotion are widespread today and are possible in any age.