Murray Rothbard Quotes

Murray Rothbard comes across as blunt and argumentative, offering sharp takes on economics, rights and truth.

24 quotes

1. 'The more consistently Austrian an economist is, the better a writer he will be.'

2. 'It is no crime to be ignorant of economics, which is, after all, a specialized discipline and one that most people consider to be a 'dismal science.' But it is totally irresponsible to have a loud and vociferous opinion on economic subjects while remaining in this state of ignorance.'

3. 'Rights may be universal, but their enforcement must be local.'

4. 'All government wars are unjust.'

5. 'The problem is that he originated nothing that was true, and that whatever he originated was wrong ...'

6. 'John Stuart was the quintessence of soft rather than hardcore, a woolly minded man of mush in striking contrast to his steel-edged father.'

7. '... shameless sponging on friends and relatives ... Marx affected a hatred and contempt for the very material resource he was too anxious to cadge and use so recklessly. Marx created an entire philosophy around his own corrupt attitudes toward money.'

8. 'All my life, it seems, I have hated the guts of Max Lerner. Now, make no mistake: there is nothing personal in this rancor. I have never met, nor have I ever had any personal dealings with, Max. No, my absolute loathing for Max Lerner is disinterested, cosmic in its grandeur. It's just that ever since I was a toddler, this ugly homunculus, this pretentious jackass, has been there, towering over the American ideological scene. In the fifty-five years that I have been aware of Max's presence, in all of his many permutations and combinations and seeming twists and turns, he has taken the totally repellent position at every step of the way.'

9. Since the State necessarily lives by the compulsory confiscation of private capital, and since its expansion necessarily involves ever-greater incursions on private individuals and private enterprise, we must assert that the State is profoundly and inherently anticapitalist.

10. Since the State necessarily lives by the compulsory confiscation of private capital, and since its expansion necessarily involves ever-greater incursions on private individuals and private enterprise, we must assert that the state is profoundly and inherently anti-capitalist .

11. Falling prices through increased production is a wonderful long-run tendency of untrammeled capitalism.

12. Cops must be unleashed, and allowed to administer instant punishment, subject of course to liability when they are in error.

13. Subjectivism is not an absolute principle; it is a necessary but not sufficient condition for sound methodology.

14. We must therefore turn to history for enlightenment; here we find that none of the proclaimed anarchist groups correspond to the libertarian position, that even the best of them have unrealistic and socialistic elements in their doctrines. Furthermore, we find that all of the current anarchists are irrational collectivists, and therefore at opposite poles from our position. We must therefore conclude that we are not anarchists, and that those who call us anarchists are not on firm etymological ground, and are being completely unhistorical.

15. What do intellectuals and opinion makers get from big government? An increasing number of cushy jobs in the bureaucracy, or in the government-subsidized sector, staffing the welfare regulatory state, and apologizing for its policies, as well as propagandizing for them among the public. To put it bluntly, intellectuals, theorists, pundits, media elites, etc. get to live a life which they could not attain on the free market, but which they can gain at taxpayer expense.

16. The major reason for Keynes's rejection of communism was simply that he could scarcely identify with the grubby proletariat.

17. Liberty and morality had to win their way slowly over many centuries, until finally expanding liberty made possible the great technological advance of the Industrial Revolution and the flowering of modern capitalism.

18. The State has invariably shown a striking talent for the expansion of its powers beyond any limits that might be imposed upon it.

19. Absolute freedom need not be lost as the price we must pay for the advent of civilization; men are born free, and need never be in chains. Man may achieve liberty and abundance, freedom and civilization.

20. Absolute freedom need not be lost as the price we must pay for the advent of civilization. Man may achieve liberty and abundance, freedom and civilization.

21. The underconsumptionist of 1819 believed that consumption would be stimulated by tariffs, while the underconsumptionist of a later day urged monetary expansion as the remedy. On the other hand, the remedy proposed for the shortage of money capital was monetary inflation in 1819, encouragement of savings and thrift in the 1930s.

22. On the market, all is harmony. But as soon as intervention appears and is established, conflict is created, for each may participate in a scramble to be a net gainer rather than a net loser - to be part of the invading team instead of one of the victims.

23. The drum-fire of propaganda that the Fed is manning the ramparts against the menace of inflation brought about by others is nothing less than a deceptive shell game. The culprit solely responsible for inflation, the Federal Reserve, is continually engaged in raising a hue-and-cry about 'inflation,' for which virtually everyone else in society seems to be responsible. What we are seeing is the old ploy by the robber who starts shouting 'Stop, thief!' and runs down the street pointing ahead at others.

24. I do not go so far as the extreme male 'sexists' who contend that women should confine themselves to the home and children and that any search for alternative careers is unnatural. On the other hand, I do not see much more support for the opposite contention that domestic-type women are violating their natures.