Bøker i Elements in Austrian Economics-serien

This Element examines the development of the pension crisis through the lens of political economy. We analyze the knowledge and incentive problems inherent in the institutional structure, governance, and accounting of public pensions. We conclude by offering several institutional, governance, and reporting reforms to address the pension crisis.

Property rights are the rules governing ownership in society. This Element offers an analytical framework to understand the origins and consequences of property rights. In analyzing property rights, the authors emphasize the complementarity of insights from a diversity of disciplinary perspectives.

This Element surveys the field of defense, peace, and war economics with particular emphasis on the contributions made by Austrian economists. I first review treatments of defense, peace, and war by the classical economists. I then discuss the rise of a distinct and systematic defense, peace, and war economics field of study starting in the 1960s. Next, I consider the contributions by Austrian economists to the field. This includes the economic analysis of the nature of the war economy, problems with the public good justification for the state-provision of defense, the seen and unseen costs of war, the idea of the liberal peace, and the realities and limitations of foreign intervention. I conclude with a discussion of some open areas for future research.

Economists commit a category mistake when they treat democratic governments as indebted. Monarchs can be indebted, as can individuals. In contrast, democracies can't truly be indebted. They are financial intermediaries that form a bridge between what are often willing borrowers and forced lenders. The language of public debt is an ideological language that promotes politically expressed desires and is not a scientific language that clarifies the practice of public finance. Economists have gone astray by assuming that a government is just another person whose impulses toward prudent action will restrict recourse to public debt and induce rational political action.

We consider three important differences of Austrian approaches to economics compared to non-Austrian: focus on culture as meaning rather than as norms, beliefs, or attitudes; emphasis on culture as an interpretative lens rather than a tool of capital; and insistence that cultural analysis be a qualitative exercise rather than a quantitative one.

Presents a new framework for Austrian capital theory, starting from the notion that capital is the value attributed by the valuer to the combination of production-goods and labor available for production. Incorporates the seminal contributions into the new framework in order to provide a more accessible perspective on Austrian capital theory.

Institutions are the 'rules of the game' that facilitate economic, social, and political interactions. They include legal rules, property rights, constitutions, political structures, and norms and customs. The Austrian economics framework provides an understanding for which institutions matter for growth, how they matter, and how they emerge and change.