Hayek on the impact of the new Austrian Economists

David B — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 23:31:00 GMT

From the Hayek Interviews in the Spring of 1979

HIGH: There are quite a number of young economists today who are studying your work and the work of Mises. How do you look on the new Austrian movement? Do you regard it as significant? How do you regard its future prospects?

HAYEK: Oh, yes, it's certainly significant. I am quite hopeful in the long run, just because of this movement, which consists not only of those who call themselves, in this country, the Austrian economists

There is a similar reaction among the young people in England and in Germany, and quite recently even in France, where it came latest. So I think the intellectual movement is wholly in the right direction. But it will take another twenty years before they will have any influence on policy, and it's quite possible in the meantime that the politicians will destroy the world so thoroughly that there's no chance of the thing taking over. But I've always made it my rule not to be concerned with current politics, but to try to operate on public opinion. As far as the movement of intellectual opinion is concerned, it is now for the first time in my life moving in the right direction.

Almost 35 years later, and we still haven't seen the level of impact he hoped for, and like he said "[the politicians may] destroy the world so thoroughly that there's no chance of the thing taking over..."

Political Theory

Hayek on the impact of the new Austrian Economists