The idea that political freedom can be preserved in the absence of economic freedom, and vice versa, is an illusion. Political freedom is the corollary of economic freedom.
Ludwig Von MisesRead
In the socialist commonwealth every economic change becomes an undertaking whose success can be neither appraised in advance nor later retrospectively determined. There is only groping in the dark. Socialism is the abolition of rational economy.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote critiques socialism, suggesting that it leads to chaotic economic changes without clear outcomes or rational evaluation.
Ludwig Von Mises argues that in a socialist system, economic changes occur without the ability to predict their success or to evaluate their impact afterward. This lack of clarity and rational planning signifies a departure from a rational economy, resulting in confusion and uncertainty akin to 'groping in the dark' where sound economic principles are abandoned.
Themes
SocialismEconomyRationalityChaosPhilosophy
In practice
Example use cases
In a debate about economic systems, one might use this quote to illustrate the difficulties of socialism.
More from Ludwig Von Mises
All quotes →Wars of aggression are popular nowadays with those nations convinced that only victory and conquest could improve their material well-being.
Ludwig Von MisesRead
Only stilted pedants can conceive the idea that there are absolute norms to tell what is beautiful and what is not. They try to derive from the works of the past a code of rules with which, as they fancy, the writers and artists of the future should comply. But the genius does not cooperate with the pundit.
Ludwig Von MisesRead
The most serious dangers for American freedom and the American way of life do not come from without.
Ludwig Von MisesRead
The public firm can nowhere maintain itself in free competition with the private firm; it is possible today only where it has a monopoly that excludes competition. Even that alone is evidence of its lesser economic productivity.
Ludwig Von MisesRead
Each epoch has found in the Gospels what it sought to find there, and has overlooked what it wished to overlook.
Ludwig Von MisesRead
Similar quotes
All things in the world come from being. And being comes from non-being.
Lao TzuRead
The game of life is a game of boomerangs. Our thoughts, deeds and words return to us sooner or later with astounding accuracy.
Florence Scovel ShinnRead
A rarer spirit never Did steer humanity; but you gods will give us Some faults to make us men.
William ShakespeareRead
Society cares for the individual only so far as he is profitable.
Simone De BeauvoirRead
In the gun game, we are the most hunted. The river of blood that washes the streets of our nation flows mostly from the bodies of our black children.
Harry BelafonteRead
It was my view then, and still is, that you don't make war without knowing why. Knowledge of course, is always imperfect, but it seemed to me that when a nation goes to war it must have reasonable confidence in the justice and imperative of its cause. You can't fix your mistakes. Once people are dead, you can't make them undead.
Tim O'BrienRead