Murray Rothbard Quotes - Page 2

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• The libertarian sees the State as a giant gang of organized criminals, who live off the theft called "taxation" and use the proceeds to kill, enslave, and generally push people around. Therefore, any property in the hands of the State is in the hands of thieves, and should be liberated as quickly as possible. Any person or group who liberates such property, who confiscates or appropriates it from the State, is performing a virtuous act and a signal service to the cause of liberty.

  Murray Rothbard

  Hands, People, Liberty

  91 Copy quote

• Monetary inflation not only raises prices and destroys the value of the currency unit; it also acts as a giant system of expropriation.

  Murray Rothbard

  Giants, Currency, Raises

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• Money ... is the nerve center of the economic system. If, therefore, the state is able to gain unquestioned control over the unit of all accounts, the state will then be in a position to dominate the entire economic system, and the whole society.

  Murray Rothbard

  Nerves, Able, Gains

  "What Has Government Done to Our Money?". Book by Murray Rothbard, 1980.

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• On the free market, everyone earns according to his productive value in satisfying consumer desires. Under statist distribution, everyone earns in proportion to the amount he can plunder from the producers.

  Murray Rothbard

  Desire, Anarchy, Plunder

  Murray N. Rothbard (2004). “Man, Economy, and State with Power and Market, Scholar's Edition”, p.1363, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• It is in war that the State really comes into its own: swelling in power, in number, in pride, in absolute dominion over the economy and the society.

  Murray Rothbard

  Peace, War, Pride

  Murray N. Rothbard (2015). “The Ethics of Liberty”, p.196, NYU Press

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• Only the State legally obtains its revenue by coercion.

  Murray Rothbard

  Coercion, States, Revenue

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

  Murray Rothbard

  Running, Fall, Long

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• It is curious that people tend to regard government as a quasi-divine, selfless, Santa Claus organization. Government was constructed neither for ability nor for the exercise of loving care; government was built for the use of force and for necessarily demagogic appeals for votes. If individuals do not know their own interests in many cases, they are free to turn to private experts for guidance. It is absurd to say that they will be served better by a coercive, demagogic apparatus.

  Murray Rothbard

  Exercise, Organization, Government

  Murray N. Rothbard (2004). “Man, Economy, and State with Power and Market, Scholar's Edition”, p.1302, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• It would be an instructive exercise for the skeptical reader to try to frame a definition of taxation which does not also include theft. Like the robber, the State demands money at the equivalent of gunpoint; if the taxpayer refuses to pay, his assets are seized by force, and if he should resist such depredation, he will be arrested or shot if he should continue to resist.

  Murray Rothbard

  Exercise, Trying, Doe

  Murray N. Rothbard (2015). “The Ethics of Liberty”, p.163, NYU Press

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• Behind the honeyed but patently absurd pleas for equality is a ruthless drive for placing themselves (the elites) at the top of a new hierarchy of power.

  Murray Rothbard

  Hierarchy, Absurd, Ruthless

  Murray Rothbard (2009). “Review of Austrian Economics, Volume 8”, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• The great non sequitur committed by defenders of the State, is to leap from the necessity of society to the necessity of the State.

  Murray Rothbard

  Liberty, Libertarian, States

  Murray N. Rothbard (2015). “The Ethics of Liberty”, p.187, NYU Press

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• Remember that the minimum wage law provides no jobs; it only outlaws them; and outlawed jobs are the inevitable result.

  Murray Rothbard

  Jobs, Law, Minimum Wage

  43 Copy quote

• The necessary consequence of an egalitarian program is the decidedly inegalitarian creation of a ruthless power elite.

  Murray Rothbard

  Creation, Program, Ruthless

  Murray Rothbard (2009). “Review of Austrian Economics, Volume 8”, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• Just as no one is morally required to answer a robber truthfully when he asks if there are any valuables in one’s house, so no one can be morally required to answer truthfully similar questions asked by the State, e.g., when filling out income tax returns.

  Murray Rothbard

  House, Income, Answers

  Murray N. Rothbard (2015). “The Ethics of Liberty”, p.183, NYU Press

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• It is clearly absurd to limit the term 'education' to a person's formal schooling.

  Murray Rothbard

  Limits, Absurd, Formal

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• The state has typically been a device for producing affluence for a few at the expense of many.

  Murray Rothbard

  Affluence, States, Expenses

  Murray Newton Rothbard (1978). “For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto”, p.209, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• You don't need a treaty to have free trade.

  Murray Rothbard

  Liberty, Needs, Libertarian

  69 Copy quote

• Instead of a bumbling and inefficient tool of society, the radical [libertarian] sees the State itself, in its very nature, as coercive, exploitative, parasitic, and hence profoundly antisocial. The State is, and always has been, the great single enemy of the human race, its liberty, happiness, and progress.

  Murray Rothbard

  Race, Enemy, Progress

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• Capitalism is the fullest expression of anarchism and anarchism is the fullest expression of capitalism.

  Murray Rothbard

  Expression, Anarchism, Capitalism

  "Exclusive Interview With Murray Rothbard". The New Banner: A Fortnightly Libertarian Journal Interview, www.lewrockwell.com. February 25, 1972.

  68 Copy quote

• There is one good thing about Marx: he was not a Keynesian.

  Murray Rothbard

  Philosophy, Political, Liberty

  The Austrian Economics Newsletter Interview, 1990.

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• The best way to help the poor is to slash taxes and allow savings, investment, and creation of jobs to proceed unhampered.

  Murray Rothbard

  Jobs, Saving, Way

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• Free-market capitalism is a network of free and voluntary exchanges in which producers work, produce, and exchange their products for the products of others through prices voluntarily arrived at.

  Murray Rothbard

  Liberty, Economics, Produce

  Murray Newton Rothbard (1997). “The Logic of Action Two: Applications and Criticism from the Austrian School”, Edward Elgar Publishing

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• Once one concedes that a single world government is not necessary, then where does one logically stop at the permissibility of separate states? If Canada and the United States can be separate nations without being denounced as in a state of impermissible ‘anarchy’, why may not the South secede from the United States? New York State from the Union? New York City from the state? Why may not Manhattan secede? Each neighbourhood? Each block? Each house? Each person?

  Murray Rothbard

  New York, Block, Government

  Murray N. Rothbard (2004). “Man, Economy, and State with Power and Market, Scholar's Edition”, p.1051, Ludwig von Mises Institute

  82 Copy quote

• Governmental subsidy systems promote inefficiency in production and efficiency in coercion and subservience, while penalizing efficiency in production and inefficiency in predation.

  Murray Rothbard

  Government, Subsidies, Coercion

  Murray N. Rothbard (2004). “Man, Economy, and State with Power and Market, Scholar's Edition”, p.1256, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• Government is a gang of thieves writ large.

  Murray Rothbard

  Government, Thieves, Gang

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