Does trade among nations promote peace? The liberal-minded Enlightenment affirmed this under the phrase “doux commerce.” At present, however, we are witnessing how economically closely linked nations are at war with each other.
It is perfectly legitimate to point out the dangers of an uncontrolled escalation of the Ukraine war. Left-wing intellectuals who do so, however, have largely adopted Putin’s propagandist view. Behind it, however, lies a dangerous ideology.
According to one criticism, Moderna and Biontech, the two manufacturers of the mRNA vaccines against Covid-19, have enriched themselves from government subsidies. This is wrong. Without the perseverance of individual researchers and billions in private money, the vaccines would not exist.
The Covid-19 crisis threw many out of work, many suffered accordingly, and labor markets were also damaged. Depending on the situation, some governments fared better than others. In any case, policymakers can learn a few things from the pandemic.
Capitalism and the market economy are the foundations of our prosperity, which, thanks to globalization, is also spreading to places in which poverty still prevailed decades ago. At the Austrian Academy 2021 experts explain to twenty-two young people why this is so.
It is not globalization, nor the market economy, nor capitalism that is a danger and should be reformed; it is the policies that might provide the wrong, anti-market response to the pandemic that are the real danger precisely to the growth of prosperity in the world’s poorest countries.
The Greens are painting a picture of environmental and climate apocalypse. In this way, they try to moralize the debate and present themselves as the advocates of the good. On closer inspection, their program turns out to be ideological wishful thinking that eschews capitalism and the market economy.
Private currencies are currently making central banks sweat. The flood of paper money is making alternative private currencies increasingly attractive. They are based on a technology that is almost unassailable, and the central banks are reacting as you would expect.
Under the guise of the COVID-19 crisis, attempts are being made to use the crisis for a political agenda that would not have found majority support before. The role of the state is expanding. A new policy approach is necessary to secure prosperity.
