The Essential Rothbard - Ludwig von Mises Institute

The Essential Rothbard 123
other contributions, a notable series of articles criticizing the
Coase theorem. 320 Jörg Guido Hülsmann has written major papers
on error cycles, counterfactuals in economic theory, and the interest
rate. Jeffrey Herbener has been (along with Salerno and
Hoppe) a major contributor to the debate on the socialist calculation
argument. Following Rothbard, these authors contend that
Mises’s argument differs from Hayek’s: Mises’s contention that a
socialist economy could not calculate is not an argument that the
planners lack the means to handle too much information or to
handle “tacit knowledge.” Rather, Mises’s point concerns the
impossibility of calculation without a system of market prices.
Herbener has also done important work on welfare economics, in
the tradition of Rothbard’s “Toward a Reconstruction of Utility
and Welfare Economics.”
In other disciplines, two of Rothbard’s closest friends merit special
mention, the intellectual historians Ralph Raico and Ronald
Hamowy. Both were members of the Circle Bastiat, a group of
Rothbard’s disciples that met in his apartment in New York during
the 1950s. 321 Raico has written a history of German classical liberalism,
as well as notable essays on World War I and on Winston
Churchill. 322 Hamowy has edited a major scholarly edition of
320
Rothbard anticipated some of Block’s concerns about Coase. He
noted that Coase “reveals grave collectivist distortions in his thinking.”
Coase would allow regulation to prevent acts that reduce competition,
but “since the State can and has defined almost any act as reducing competition,
this opens the gates for tyranny.” Letter to Kenneth Templeton,
July 16, 1957; Rothbard Papers.
321The Circle Bastiat consisted of: Murray Rothbard, Ralph Raico,
Ronald Hamowy, George Reisman, Leonard Liggio, and Robert Hessen.
322Ralph Raico, German Liberalism: Die Partei der Freiheit: Studien zur
Geschichte des deutschen Liberalismus (Stuttgart: Lucius & Lucius, 1999)
and Classical Liberalism: Historical Essays in Political Economy (London:
Routledge, forthcoming). Two notable essays are found in The Costs of
War, Denson, ed., “World War I: The Turning Point” and “Rethinking
Churchill.”