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Welcome Note

By Jimbo Ar

I like to start this blog by introducing my self, my name is Jaime Artieda. I am currently pursuing a double degree in Economics and Global Affairs at George Mason University. If you got to this web blog home page you are either my family, friend, colleague, professor or you are naturally interested in the subjects of economics, politics, philosophy and liberty.

The name of this blog may sound a bit strange to some of you. However, behind the name of “Austrian Knights,” there is an emotional, historical and academic reason. In the fall of 2005 I was introduced to the documentary called The Commanding Heights of the Economy produced by PBS based on the book written by Daniel Yergin and Joseph Stanislaw. The battle of ideas of who should control the economy, debate that developed in between F.A. Hayek and John Maynard Keynes, is the main subject of the documentary’s first chapters. The argument of whether the state or the free market should control the economy takes the viewer to know about the Austrian School of Economic Thought.

The Austrian School believes that markets work and governments do not. The fight of capitalism against communism, socialism, and totalitarianism was the core of human history of the 20th century. In late 1980’s and early 1990’s with the Fall of the Berlin Wall some thought that the battle was over. Unluckily for all of us the battle is not near to its end. On a daily basis people who have little to none knowledge in economics blame the so called “market failures” and “capitalism” still grow a bigger gap among rich and poor, and among developed and developing world.

However, that is not true. It has been the government interventionism within the economy and our lives the reason why the free market has not been able to create a better society, a better us. History is full of examples of how big governments have denied people of important principles such as freedom, economic prosperity, and human growth. Just to name a few examples; Vladimir Lenin, Adolf Hitler, Kim Jong-Il, and Hugo Chavez, have or had neglected human principles and created totalitarian regimes.

Individuals like; Frederic Bastiat, Carl Menger, Eugen von Bohm-Bawerk, Friedrich von Wieser,Ludwig von Mises, F.A. Hayek, Murray Rothbard, and Israel Kirzner, to name a few were interested in how the free market would be a tool that will develop individual prosperity. All these exceptional individuals are members of the Austrian School of Economics. (In a coming post I will talk in more depth about the origins and history about this school)

After this brief introduction to this web blog, I want to thank you for your interest in this blog. This blog was created in the pursuit of freedom, seeks to promote free market values through the understanding of politics, philosophy, and economics.

Welcome to Austrian Knights!

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