Words matter. These are the best Steve Hanke Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
Although floating and fixed rates appear dissimilar, they are members of the same freemarket family. Both operate without exchange controls and are free-market mechanisms for balance-of-payment adjustments.
With the passing of Milton Friedman on November 16, 2006, we lost one of the great champions of free markets.
The IMF is set up to deal with liquidity crises.
Following Greece’s defeat at the hands of Turkey in 1897, Greece’s fiscal house was entrusted to a Control Commission. During the 20th century, the drachma was one of the world’s worst currencies. It recorded the world’s sixth highest hyperinflation. In October 1944, Greece’s monthly inflation rate hit 13,800%.
With interest rates artificially low, consumers reduce savings in favor of consumption, and entrepreneurs increase their rates of investment spending.
Since China embraced Deng Xiaoping’s reforms on 22 December 1978, China has experimented with different exchange-rate regimes. Until 1994, the yuan was in an ever-depreciating phase against the U.S. dollar.
Government buffer-stock schemes are rife with politics, and instead of generating profits from buying low and selling high, they tend to generate losses.
During the Greenspan-Bernanke era, the Fed has embraced the view that stability in the economy and stability in prices are mutually consistent. As long as inflation remains at or below its target level, the Fed’s modus operandi is to panic at the sight of real or perceived economic trouble and provide emergency relief.
In 2008, Bitcoin was mysteriously introduced to the world in an obscure, technical paper written under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto. By late 2013, the financial press was filled with reportage on Bitcoin and its dramatic price increase.
Contrary to what most people think, bank money is much more important than state money. In Greece, for example, bank money makes up 84.26% of the total money supply.
A minimum wage leads to higher levels of unemployment.
Let the market, not politicians, determine the flow of rice, oil and other commodities. Lower, more stable prices will ensue.
Sanctions historically are quite counterproductive in the sense that if you impose sanctions on your enemy, it tends to strengthen your enemy.
When the dollar goes down relative to other currencies, the price of wheat, corn, rice and oil all go up in dollar terms.
When I was operating as one of President Reagan’s economic advisers, an early assignment was to analyze the federal government’s landholdings and make recommendations about what to do with them. This was a big job. These lands are vast, covering an area six times that of France.
If you squeeze and squeeze, and you don’t allow the Iranians to sell any oil, then what do they have to lose by shutting the Strait of Hormuz down? And if they do that, that’s 35% of all the world’s oil that comes through the strait and 20% of the liquefied natural gas in the world.
It turns out that the rich are much better placed to feed at the public trough. The poor get crumbs.
In January 2013, one could buy a Bitcoin for about $13. By late November, one Bitcoin would have set a buyer back over $1100.
