deficit

inflation

nature

pollution

nationality

American

occupation / innovator as

philosopher

economist

historian

activist

professor

essayist

cause of death

natural causes

religion

atheism

university teacher

innovator in the field of

libertarianism

general economics

is no mure cured by raising taxes than an illness is cured by shooting the patient.

While deficits are often inflationary and always pernicious, curing them by raising taxes is equivalent to curing an illness by shooting the patient. Murray Rothbard

The natural tendency of the state is inflation.

is simply the environment on earth in which man finds himself, and to treat it as a separate being in the image of man is sheer nonsense.

Nature is simply the environment on earth in which man finds himself, and to treat it as a separate being in the image of man is sheer nonsense. Murray Rothbard

is largely a result of the fact that nature has been taken out of the free market. Because it is owned by the government, no one has any economic incentive to preserve the purity and value of nature.

First, the rivers. The rivers, and the oceans too, are generally owned by the government... private property, certainly complete private property, has not been permitted in the water. In essence, then, government owns the rivers. But government ownership is not true ownership, because the government officials, while able to control the resource cannot themselves reap their capital value on the market. Government officials cannot sell the rivers or sell stock in them. Hence, they have no economic incentive to preserve the purity and value of the rivers. Rivers are, then, in the economic sense, 'unowned'... therefore government officials have permitted their corruption and pollution. Anyone has been able to dump polluting garbage and wastes in the waters. But consider what would happen if private firms were able to own the rivers and the lakes. If a private firm owned Lake Erie, for example, then anyone dumping garbage in the lake would be promptly sued in the courts for their aggression against private property and would be forced by the courts to pay damages and to cease and desist from any further aggression. Thus, only private property rights will insure an end to pollution invasion of resources. Only because the rivers are unowned is there no owner to rise up and defend his precious resource from attack. If, in contrast, anyone should dump garbage or pollutants into a lake which is privately owned (as are many smaller lakes), he would not be permitted to do so for very long the owner would come roaring to its defense.

is, for the libertarian, a problem best solved not with government programs but simply for the courts to return to their function of defending person and property rights against invasion, and therefore to enjoin anyone from injecting pollutants into the air.

The remedy against air pollution is therefore crystal clear, and it has nothing to do with multibillion-dollar palliative government programs at the expense of the taxpayers which do not even meet the real issue. The remedy is simply for the courts to return to their function of defending person and property rights against invasion, and therefore to enjoin anyone from injecting pollutants into the air. But what of the propollution defenders of industrial progress' And what of the increased costs that would have to be borne by the consumer' And what of our present polluting technology'

Murray RothbardThinkers

Murray Rothbard