Abstract: Essentially, there are two competing views of how to overcome an economy-wide recession/depression. The Austrian view understands the free-play of competition as the most potent means to overcome the short-run mismatch between an excessive boom-level of nominal wages/prices and depressed crisis-level volume of aggregate spending. In the Keynesian view, the disastrous mismatch between desired saving and planned investment inherent in capitalist economies requires the government to step in and take up the burden of spending to infuse the lacking demand for products and labor.

The thought experiment presented in the paper is designed to provide the reader with a direct comparison of major analytical claims of the two competing approaches to assess the ability of each of the two to affect, positively or negatively, employment, capital accumulation, and the general standard of living/real wages.

Download Paper: “A Thought Experiment Comparing Austrian and Keynesian Stimulus Packages”

Abstract: George Reisman’s magnum opus Capitalism: A Treatise on Economics is a monumental attempt at theoretical integration of leading economic phenomena into one unified whole. Few such books have been published in the history of economics. Still fewer of them contain a comparable proportion of path-breaking innovations both in approach and substance that are integrated in a tightly-spun system of thought that Capitalism does. Yet despite its numerous path-breaking contributions to economic theory, the book has attracted virtually zero attention from the scientific community. History shows that for the most part this has been the fate of all great innovations in science. This review attempts (a) to point out reasons why the book’s content is revolutionary, and (b) to finally start a serious discussion of its substantive ideas. Specifically, the review focuses in some detail on some of Reisman’s most important innovations which all point the way to a wholly new direction in economic theory that promises to provide the hitherto unseen conformity with empirical reality, analytical rigor, and doctrinal integration.

Download Paper: “A Treatise for A New Age in Economic Theory: A Review of George Reisman’s Capitalism”