Capitalism benefiting the poor?

Konkin on Libertarian Strategy - Murray N. Rothbard - Mises Institute: "the emergence of wage labor was an enormous boon for many thousands of poor workers and saved them from starvation. If there is no wage labor — as there was not in most production before the Industrial Revolution — then each worker must have enough money to purchase his own capital and tools. One of the great things about the emergence of the factory system and wage labor is that poor workers did not have to purchase their own capital equipment; this could be left to the capitalists. (Thus, see F.A. Hayek's brilliant introduction in his Capitalism and the Historians.)"

The Forgotten People

The Forgotten People: "It's not in the least surprising that Iran and Hamas ardently support Sudan's Master Mortician. According to the speaker of Iran's parliament, Ali Larijani, the global arrest warrant for Gen. al-Bashir is an 'insult to all Muslims.' (Minneapolis Star Tribune, March 27).

Mr. Larijani, what do you call the starving deaths of those four black Muslim children at the Shangil Tobaya refugee camp?"

Who does the U.N. represent?

The Forgotten People: "Meanwhile, the ghoulish head of that sovereign state - a member in good standing of the United Nations - is presumably a wanted man around the world after the International Criminal Court (ICC) last month issued warrants for his arrest on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity."

This shows one of the major problems with the U.N. -- it represents the rulers of nations, not necessarily the people of those nations. Many of the members of the U.N. are not even indirectly chosen by the people.

Blowing Bubbles - Doug French - Mises Institute

Blowing Bubbles - Doug French - Mises Institute: "The Austrian theory points out that it is government's increasing the supply of money that serves to lower interest rates below the natural rate or the rate that would be set by the collective time preferences of savers in the market. Entrepreneurs react to these lower interest rates by investing in 'higher order' goods in the production chain, as opposed to consumer goods.

Despite these actions by government, consumer time preferences remain the same. There is no real increase in the demand for higher order goods and instead of capital flowing into what the unfettered market would dictate — it flows into malinvestment. The greater the monetary expansion, in terms of both time and enormity, the longer the boom will be sustained.

But eventually there must be a recession or depression to liquidate not only inefficient and unprofitable businesses, but malinvestments in speculation — whether it is stocks, bonds, real estate, art, or tulip bulbs."

Greenspan's Bogus Defense - Robert P. Murphy - Mises Institute

Greenspan's Bogus Defense - Robert P. Murphy - Mises Institute: "Since the participants in the mortgage market wisely realized that rates wouldn't be held at 1% forever, they didn't foolishly drop their own yields down so far. Then in June 2004, when Greenspan began ratcheting the federal-funds rate back up, it is perfectly understandable that mortgage rates wouldn't rise with them.

To repeat, Greenspan's defense of his policies made it sound as if he tried to push up mortgage rates, but that they wouldn't budge. Yet, as the chart above makes clear, Greenspan didn't really push up very hard on rates."

"Greenspan repeats the claim that Asian savings were the real culprit. But there are two problems with this theory: first, global savings rates continued to rise throughout the housing boom and bust. So it's very difficult to explain the peak of the housing boom with reference to Asian saving. (In contrast, Greenspan's actions with short-term rates fit the fortunes of the housing market much more closely.)

But a second major problem is that even on its own terms, the influx of blind Asian saving — to the extent it existed at all — was itself partially a product of Greenspan's monetary inflation. Remember that the Chinese central bank had maintained a rigid peg to the dollar until it was pressured to drop it — right around the time the housing boom faltered.

To put it somewhat simplistically, when Greenspan flooded the world with more dollars, the dollar fell sharply against most major currencies. But in order for the Chinese to keep the renminbi (yuan) from appreciating against the dollar as well, they had to load up on dollar-denominated assets, such as US Treasuries. Thus, Greenspan's inflation in combination with the Chinese peg, on paper might have appeared as an irrational influx of Asian investment, which stubbornly refused to subside even as US indebtedness grew."