Established 1999
New England, USA
There is no particular reason to expect that education or intellectual interests are an advantage in cultivating a habit of awareness of the sort Kirzner highlights. But there are very good reasons to argue that profits, deserved or not, are something that entrepreneurs should be legally entitled to seek.
The consumer surplus that we derive from buying water, and other items, is enormous, almost incalculable. The fact that all of these products, services, and useful things are available to us at low prices seems automatic, nothing very interesting or important. In fact, the capitalist system operating in the background is performing miracles of production,…
No one created that muddy track; it is the result of individuals going where they want to go. But if enough people walk there, it wears out the grass and makes the ground hard and packed down. The “path” emerges, although no one planned it.
The alarmists’ real concern is not the growth of population; it’s prosperity. Their concern is that the resources of the earth will be used up, and that humanity has to prepare by becoming fewer and poorer. But all the evidence points in the opposite direction.
Moral norms that served small bands of humans well 10,000 years ago — share, cooperate, punish anyone who violates the rules — are no longer very good at helping people navigate commercial society. Ask someone about price-gouging laws, or kidney sales, or generally talk about the role of price as an indispensable signal of scarcity.…
Since November 2016 several Duke University colleagues have come into my office, closed the door, and said, “Okay. You were right. Are you happy now?”
We can often make progress by pressing for improvement, rather than holding out for perfection. Sometimes, just the right kind of nothing is good enough.
There is no particular reason to expect that education or intellectual interests are an advantage in cultivating a habit of awareness of the sort Kirzner highlights. But there are very good reasons to argue that profits, deserved or not, are something that entrepreneurs should be legally entitled to seek.
The consumer surplus that we derive from buying water, and other items, is enormous, almost incalculable. The fact that all of these products, services, and useful things are available to us at low prices seems automatic, nothing very interesting or important. In fact, the capitalist system operating in the background is performing miracles of production,…
No one created that muddy track; it is the result of individuals going where they want to go. But if enough people walk there, it wears out the grass and makes the ground hard and packed down. The “path” emerges, although no one planned it.
The alarmists’ real concern is not the growth of population; it’s prosperity. Their concern is that the resources of the earth will be used up, and that humanity has to prepare by becoming fewer and poorer. But all the evidence points in the opposite direction.
Moral norms that served small bands of humans well 10,000 years ago — share, cooperate, punish anyone who violates the rules — are no longer very good at helping people navigate commercial society. Ask someone about price-gouging laws, or kidney sales, or generally talk about the role of price as an indispensable signal of scarcity.…
Since November 2016 several Duke University colleagues have come into my office, closed the door, and said, “Okay. You were right. Are you happy now?”
We can often make progress by pressing for improvement, rather than holding out for perfection. Sometimes, just the right kind of nothing is good enough.