Hayek on Money, the Business Cycle, and the Gold Standard
These seven works taken together represent the first integration and systematic elaboration of the Austrian theories of money, capital, business cycles, and comparative monetary institutions, which constitute the essential core of Austrian macroeconomics. The creation of such an oeuvre would be a formidable intellectual feat over an entire lifetime; it is an absolute marvel when we consider that Hayek had completed it in the span of eight years (1929-1937) and still well shy of his fortieth birthday. FULL ARTICLE
Comments (9)
fundamentalist
Thanks for producing this book. I'm looking forward to owning it. But I'm curious about Hayek's essay "Profits, Interest, and Investment." All of the online repositories seem to have skipped this essay. I'm reading it now and find it really interesting. Is there something wrong with it that has caused people to ignore it?
Published: October 8, 2008 8:32 AM
Dan Mahoney
Outstanding. Is there any way this introduction can be downloaded as a .pdf file?
Published: October 8, 2008 8:36 AM
Mises.org Updates
Dan, you can extract it from the entire book available on the Literature tab
Published: October 8, 2008 8:46 AM
Sukrit
I love how the Mises Institute gives away books for free. It's consistent, since Stephan Kinsella wants to abolish all Intellectual Property! You won't get that sort of generosity from the State-o Institute... oops I mean Cato.
Published: October 8, 2008 8:52 AM
Todd
I can't read this stuff fast enough... thanks for reproducing it for us!
Published: October 8, 2008 9:41 AM
Ralph Harrison
I just noticed that gold is trading around $900
which is where it was in the crisis of 1980. Does that mean that my dollar income in 2008 could buy at the prices of my dollar income in 1980?
Published: October 8, 2008 10:19 AM
Ryan
I recently bought this book along with Mises' Theory of Money and Credit. I cannot wait to begin reading them. I've already read Hayek's Prices and Production and a few of the other articles, but it's great to have all these resources in one beautiful book. I'll read these to escape from the terrible news of the past month.
Published: October 8, 2008 10:40 AM
Stanley Pinchak
Ralph Harrison,
no unfortunately, the dollar has substantially decreased in purchasing power since 1980. Despite the equivalence in the gold price, there are other factors that need to be taken into account, which disprove the equality or purchasing power of 1980 dollars to 2008 dollars. If one looked at the flawed price level of a basket of goods and services, almost any combination would still show that a dollar in 1980 buys much more than a 2008 dollar. If one could create a price level looking at all goods and services available in both 2008 and 1980, the same trend would be apparent. The fed has been increasing the number of dollars significantly since 1980 thus, despite the "low" price of gold now, the purchasing power of the dollar has substantially decreased. The moral of the story is that gold is theoretically way under priced (or the dollar is way overvalued compared to gold).
Published: October 8, 2008 11:29 AM
Ralph Harrison
Thanks Stanley, what you are saying is there is no basket of goods and services that are comparable between 1980 and 2008. I can see that since home computers, cell phones, the internet, HDTV, autos, and many home features are widely used or are much better today.
The best comparable would be my $70,000 house financed with a 9% mortgage would now be worth maybe $200,000 using a 5.25% mortgage. Can you add anything to this thought process with this example?
Published: October 8, 2008 1:10 PM