George Will Finally Asks A Few Important Questions
From the Newsweek magazine issue dated Sep 22 2008 and posted online on Sep 13,2008.:
Pencils and Politics by George Will
"Improbable as it might seem, perhaps the most important fact for a voter or politician to know is: No one can make a pencil. That truth is the essence of a novella that is, remarkably, both didactic and romantic. Even more remarkable, its author is an economist. If you read Russell Roberts's "The Price of Everything: A Parable of Possibility and Prosperity" you will see the world afresh--unless you already understand Friedrich Hayek's idea of spontaneous order..."
The ideas behind Leonard Read's "I,Pencil" have finally made it into Newsweek 50 years later.
Hayek's essay "The Use of Knowledge in Society" first appeared in American Economic Review, XXXV, No. 4; September, 1945, pp. 519-30.
Comments (2)
Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
I feel sure that Hazlitt addressed the division of labor in his Newsweek column sometime in the 50s and 60s.
Published: September 15, 2008 10:06 AM
Justin Ptak
Thank you Lew. I am now quite comforted by the fact that Henry Hazlitt addressed the idea 40 or 50 years ago.
Published: September 16, 2008 4:31 AM