Newbies

Re: Veterans to Austrian Thought, a question...

Zach — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 21:27:31 GMT

Hmm, ok, thanks to both of you. I've been reading the articles for a while- they're really informative.

Re: Veterans to Austrian Thought, a question...

hayekianxyz — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 04:21:20 GMT

You're absolutely right in beginning with Callahan's book. Although, even before reading this I'd recommend An Introduction to Economic Reasoning by Gordon. I'm a big fan of Hazlitt's book in as much as it's interesting to read and will probably encourage you to read more on AE, however, it won't teach you much new. I'd still advise reading. Following these two go for Menger's Principles of Economics, it's around 300 pages and is generally regarded as the beginning of the Austrian School, I wouldn't suggest reading MES before Menger's book, there's also a study guide by Rostan on the literature section.

I think at this point you'd be able to tackle MES, Rothbard has a very comprehensive writing style and the book is extremely interesting so it's not too difficult to read, especially not with Murphies study guide. As for The Revolution, I'm not sure, I haven't read it but I can't imagine that it would teach you much that the others wouldn't, as the the Ballve book I have no idea. Although, I seem to remember it being mentioned in Tucker's recent article so go check there.

Perhaps before MES you could read some of Rothbard's articles of methodology, or read Hoppe's Economic Science and the Austrian Method.

In terms of money, there's Rothbard's Case for 100 Percent Gold Dollar, The Case Against the Fed, The Mystery of Banknig and America's Great Depression. If you want to learn about the Austrian Buisness Cycle Theory, Salerno has a good lecture on it, Huerta de Soto's book which goes into it in a lot of detail as well as works by Mises and Hayek.

Re: Veterans to Austrian Thought, a question...

liberty student — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 04:20:43 GMT

Welcome Zach!

As you get going, you will start to refine and define where your next area of learning will take you.

That is a good list, you might want to include reading the Daily Articles here at Mises.org as well as the LewRockwell Daily Articles (not the blog, the front page articles).

Also, Lew's Podcasts are excellent, as well as the media section here at Mises.org.

Veterans to Austrian Thought, a question...

Zach — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 04:05:11 GMT

So I compiled a list of things I might want to read to get a decent grasp on the school, listed below. Overall, is this a good selection? Cite books that "overlap" (cover material gone over in other books), better books I could use, books I should take out, and additional ones I should read. Thanks, really appreciated!

Economics for Real People by Gene Callahan, Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt, The Revolution: A Manifesto by Ron Paul, Essentials of Economics by Faustino Ballve, Free Market Economics: A Reader by assorted authors (edited by Bettina Bien Grieves), Man, Economy, and State by Murray Rothbard, etc.

Oh, I'm not quite sure where to begin to look for literature (that can be digested by someone new to economics) on the privitization of money/the Fed.