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Ludwig Lachmann's Capital and Its Structure ([1956] 1978) is a classic in the literature in Austrian economics. It is mainly discussed in relation to the Austrian contributions to the macroeconomics debates of that time - from Hayek's dispute with Keynes to the capital controversies of Cambridge UK and Cambridge US. Among Lachmann's many ideas developed in that work, critical is his idea that the capital structure of an economy consists of heterogeneous capital goods that have multiple specific uses. This fact of the world makes the intertemporal coordination of economic plans a complex phenomenon and not a simple phenomenon. In the standard macroeconomic account, the coordination failure results from a distortion to the interest rate which miscommunicates to economic actors the underlying savings and consumption pattern in the economy at that time. This results in a boom/bust cycle, as the malinvestments in production projects are revealed in time and must go through a costly correction. But this discussion is simply an illustration of a much broader set of problems of relative prices as guides to productive activity in an economy and the problem of economic calculation. Our chapter explores the capital theoretic side of the socialist calculation debate and highlights the importance that an understanding of the capitalusing economy consisting of production plans made up of heterogeneous goods with multiple specific uses is to the argument about the calculation problem being the lynchpin argument against the feasibility of socialist economic planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores James Buchanan’s contributions to monetary economics and argues these contributions form the foundation of a robust monetary economics paradigm. While often not recognized for his contributions to monetary economics, Buchanan’s scholarship offers important insights for current debates, especially the renewed interest in narrow banking in the wake of the financial crisis. We argue that the post-2007 crisis milieu creates a unique opportunity to recognize, as Buchanan did, the vital role that money plays in the market as the ‘grammar of commerce.’ That recognition makes the need for more fundamental reform of our monetary regimes at the constitutional level more apparent, making Buchanan’s work on monetary constitutions more relevant than ever before. We then discuss how adopting Buchanan’s monetary framework can improve both monetary scholarship and institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper replies to 'The Servants of Obama's Machinery,' which is a criticism of Boettke's interpretation of Hayek's ideas in The Road to Serfdom. We find the authors raise many interesting questions for both political economy and history of thought but ultimately are unconvincing in their critique. In addition to responding to their overall critique, we also respond to their smaller points on Hayek and Arrow, Public Choice, and the historical problems they raise. Despite our disagreement we believe this is a fruitful line of discussion and deserves to be looked into further both theoretically and empirically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT. Since 1992, the rhetoric of Russian economic reformers has been one of full-speed ahead to a free-market economy. The reality, however, has diverged significantly from this rhetoric at both a broad "rules of the game" level and specific "policy within rules" level. The resulting ambiguity of the economic environment and the lingering effects of the previous system which is supposed to be reformed has led to a continued deterioration of the Russian economy. This paper offers a modified defense of "shock therapy" as a path to a cure for Russia's economic malaise, as opposed to the cure itself. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comments on Kevin Dowd's article `Money and the Market: What Role for Government?' about money and markets in economic reform of the ex-communist countries in Europe published in a 1993 issue of `The CATO Journal.' Failure of the Perestroika; Centrality of money; Monetary regimes and credibility; Requisites of liberalization.

Efforts to export democracy and liberty through military intervention have often been ineffective and have resulted in unintended and undesirable consequences. Countries are free because of belief systems, and institutions that follow from those beliefs, which support and reinforce political and economic freedom. Rational constructivist attempts at nation building are therefore likely to fail in places where there is no tradition of such beliefs and institutions. In this superb book Coyne argues that principled non-interventionism and free trade have historically had the greatest degree of success and should be our guiding policies today. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ludwig von Mises published I Nation, State and Economy i in 1919, on the heels of WWI-- of which he participated as a solider. Already an established monetary economist after the publication of his I Theory of Money and Credit i in 1912, Mises was also well known as a leading representative of liberalism. The Society for Development of Austrian Economics in November 2018 held a panel featuring Christopher Coyne, Richard Ebeling and Benjamin Powell who each addressed fundamental insights from Mises's great work. [Extracted from the article]