Bob Murphy

Author Archive

The Exclusivity of Salvation Through Christ

At church today my pastor was discussing the following from Luke 13: 22 And He went through the cities and villages, teaching, and journeying toward Jerusalem. 23 Then one said to Him, “Lord, are there few who are saved?” And He said to them, 24 “Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I […]

Old-School Mises

Vaughn Kraft, one of my frequent Mises Academy students, sent me this email (and gave permission to reprint): A gentleman friend of mine had recently told me a story about his interview with Von Mises to enter the Austrian master’s program. This took place around 1959 or 1960, when Von Mises interviewed him for the […]

What’s Worse (Better) Than Sunday Blog Posts?

A whole conference dedicated to bringing free-market ideas to evangelical Christians! (The link is to the main website of The Institute for Faith, Work, and Economics, which is hosting me and a dozen or so other theologians and/or economists at a conference outside of DC.) They showed us this snazzy video after the opening dinner: […]

Murphy vs. Graeber on Money, Round 2

Some 5,000 years ago, anthropologist David Graeber and I battled over his scathing critique of the standard economist (and Mengerian) account of the origin of money. He insisted that I read his book before sputtering more nonsense, and so I got The American Conservative to get me a copy. My review is now online. The […]

Everyone On the Internet Thinks I’m Hilarious

Or at least, of the people who are my Facebook friends, that is the overwhelming consensus. In related news, here are “4 Politically Controversial Issues Where All Economists Agree” (actual title), which I got from an enthusiastic link from Daniel Kuehn. Here are the four issues, as the blogger (Adam Ozimek) titles the sections–and I’m […]

Landsburg v 2.0: This Time, It’s Personal

Steve Landsburg is putting out a revised edition of his classic, The Armchair Economist. Full details here. Although Murray Rothbard is the economist who most influenced me, Landsburg’s book might be the single most influential volume in terms of how I try to relay economics to the layperson. What may interest you is that I […]

Jon Stewart Has Great Marketing Ideas

The Daily Show with Jon StewartGet More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

I Don’t Think He Liked Tyler Cowen’s New Book

Holy cow, Robert Wenzel links to this NYT review (“A Contrarian Chowhound Weighs In”) of Cowen’s new book. I haven’t read the book, but this guy (Dwight Garner) really puts on a show that is worth quoting: Tyler Cowen’s “An Economist Gets Lunch” arrives on the table like a big, unidentifiable, whey-colored casserole. After 75 […]