The Instituto Ludwig von Mises Ecuador is born

(Austrian) Economics, Education, Libertarian Theory
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When I embarked upon the task of teaching Austrian Economics at USFQ (as ECN101 and with some concessions to the mainstream such  as teaching their flawed theories before attacking them) I couldn’t predict beforehand if I was going to find either resistance or support from my students and colleagues. I promise to tell TLS readers about the latter in another occasion. Of every class of 30-33 students for ECN101 I end up focusing on the 5-10 that are really into the material. We read a lot of Hoppe, Rothbard, Reisman, Dilorenzo, Kinsella and Block. Of course I tell my students that my class’ purpose is to show them a different point of view, since the “official” one can be found on the MSM of Ecuador and the U.S. and other classes even at USFQ (most PhD professors being either natural science types or liberal arts former hippies that support any soft form of socialism you can imagine there is.)

Of course of this 5-10 (per class, and I teach 3 classes per semester) maybe 2 or 3 become ardent libertarians and are encouraged to attend Mises University and FEE Seminars during the following summer. Last semester, I taught an “Advanced Libertarianism” seminar for the 12 best students from the past two years. Their enthusiasm being at a peak, they decided to do as Helio Beltrao and his libertarian cadre did in Brazil and create a LVMI-Ecuador think tank. My students Esteban Perez, Cindy Aguiar, Esteban Torres, Lizeth Torres, Alejandro Veintimilla, Pablo Mateus, Paul Riera and Lizeth Vasconez are the culprits: they are they driving force for LVMI-Ecuador. I’ll just say you better remember their names, they are very young but I bet they will make the headlines of libertarian and MSM publications later on.

The most exciting thing is that thanks to web 2.0 we can hold board meetings via Skype, promote our articles (60% of mises.ec being the translated Mises Daily articles) and events (this Wednesday we begin with “Cuba and the elephants” a thought-provoking documentary) via Facebook and keep our fixed costs to $40usd a year (for the .ec domain.)

In sum, today I want to share with you the official launch of www.mises.ec as the core service the Instituto Ludwig von Mises Ecuador has to offer the region and country in which it operates.

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Does Going to the DMV Hurt Worse than a Root Canal, or Is It Just Me?

Nanny Statism, Taxation
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Some time ago, having just gotten rid of a car, I figured it best to turn in my plates and get that magnanimous refund from NY State for the registration fee on my erstwhile means of transportation.  Being somewhat “unplugged” from the typical goings-on at the Department of Motor Vehicles, I decided to drop by on a Friday afternoon, the last Friday afternoon of the month to be exact. A mistake. A BIG mistake.

You see, on the last day of the month, there apparently is a big rush to get things done at the DMV.  Well, there’s a big rush for the customers.  The people working at the DMV frankly didn’t seem all that rushed.  And that’s from whence the question that titles this essay emanates.  First, let’s recap my visit.

Arrival:  1415 hours (That’s 2:15pm for those who are military-time-challenged.)

Obtaining of Ticket:  1455 hours  (That’s 40 minutes later.)

Visit with Cashier:  1525 hours (That’s 30 minutes after that.)

Departure:  1530 hours (That’s 5 minutes later still.)

Yes, it took me 75 minutes (1 hour and 15 minutes) to accomplish a 5-minute task at the DMV.  For those unfamiliar with this incredibly demeaning scenario, allow me to explain some of the subtleties.  When one arrives at the DMV, at least in my county, he is met with a line that leads to an “information counter.”  This is where they tell you where you need to go next, what forms you have to fill out before you get there, and where they also—in a stroke of bureaucratic genius—give you a ticket with a number on it.  This number corresponds to an electronic display that provides a sort of visual presentation of the “Next!” one hears at the barber shop.  On the ticket is the number for which you should look, and an estimate of how long you’ll be waiting.  You may then go to any one of the fine church-style pews to sit and wait.  Hopefully, you brought a book.

In essence then, one has waited in a line that is not hidden to wait in a line that is hidden.

The punch line:  All of this is an improvement—a vast improvement—over what used to happen at the DMV.  I’m not saying it was bad.  It was worse than bad.  If one was smart, he showed up with a lunch box, or at least a snack.  Standing on line for an hour or so on an empty stomach is tough!  Plus, once one got to the counter, he was faced with a person who himself was pissed off to be there.  A disgruntled worker meeting a disgruntled customer does not a recipe for statist happiness make.

Here’s what I’m trying to figure out:  If I had a choice of vendors for this service, would it still be so terribly inefficient and, frankly, crappy?  I don’t think it requires a degree in, or even an understanding of, Austrian Economics to emphatically declare, “No.”

Cross-Posted at the LRCBlog.

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eBook: Fifty Economic Fallacies Exposed

(Austrian) Economics, Anti-Statism, Education, Non-Fiction Reviews
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Understanding basic economics is crucial for all libertarians.  No other field offers as clear and irrefutable a case for liberty.  Indeed, statism draws much of its support from the public’s flawed understanding of economics.  Even libertarians are occasionally led astray by flawed economic reasoning.  A friend recently brought a book designed to combat such flaws to my attention:  Geoffrey E. Wood’s Fifty Economic Fallacies Exposed.

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(Statist) Politics as Household Management

Anti-Statism, Democracy, Libertarian Theory, Vulgar Politics
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In a previous post, Voting, Moral Hazard, and Like Buttons, I discussed the moral hazards of voting and why democracy does not legitimize the state or protect our liberty. I also discussed how statist democracy, particularly representative democracy, is manipulative and conducive to top-down central planning of society. (Statist) politics tends to reduce all basic social issues to problems requiring administrative manipulation. In this post, I’m going to delve into this issue further and draw upon insights by Hannah Arendt in The Human Condition1 to illustrate how (statist) politics is inherently an attempt to run society as one massive organization, organism, or machine.

Hannah Arendt’s analysis of the differences between action (praxis)2 and work – and between politics, which involves action, and fabrication or making (poi?sis), which involves work – has negative implications for the central planning of society that is characteristic of modern representative-democratic states. In particular, I have in mind her criticism of Plato, and to a lesser extent Aristotle, regarding their tendency to view society as a sort of organization and politics as the running of society as such an organization – or, in their words, politics as akin to household management. This fits with the tendency in many cultures to refer to one’s country as “the Fatherland” or “the Motherland” and with socialists and communitarians (on the left and the right) essentially modeling their ideal society after the family.

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  1. All page numbers, provided for your convenience, refer to the 1998 2nd Edition. ↩

  2. Arendt uses the term ‘action’ more narrowly than do the praxeologists of the Austrian School. ↩

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Dollar Got the Blues: The Official Song of Dollar-Haters

(Austrian) Economics, Pop Culture, Statism
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The song was written in 1971 by Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown, a long-time resident of Slidell, Louisiana.

Live 04/16/83 in Hamburg, Germany: Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown (guitar/vocals), Homer Brown (tenorsax), Bill Samuell (tenorsax), Joe Sunseri (baritonesax), Craig Wroten (piano), Miles Wright (bass), Robert Shipley (drums).

HT Dick Clark for bringing this to my attention.

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