Frederic Bastiat

[Skreimey]

For those of you interested in classic works concerning economics and politics, I highly recommend Frederic Bastiat. He was a French political economist and classical liberal whom wrote during the French Revolution. Many of his works are freely available online, and for those of you with android phones, I know several of his writings are available for free from the Google play store. You can also find them for free on Amazon's book store if that's how you roll.

The Law is probably his most well known work. It is also one of the most compelling arguments against state inteference that I have read.

http://bastiat.org/en/the_law.html

Also, if you were to read his essays on political economy such as Capital and Interest, I think you will be amazed at how similar the economic issues confronting France in 1848 are to the issues we face in America today. The English translations are easy reads and his arguments are often supported with very intuitive illustrations. There are a few religious overtones in his work, but keep in mind that he wrote at a time where heresy was still dangerous.

What I found most interesting was his assessment of the effects of market uncertainty on the usage of capital. Bastiat wrote that in revolutionary France, owners of capital were very reluctant to invest in production due to the risk of rapid political changes destroying their investments. The bourgeois therefore spent their money on luxuries instead of wealth-producing endeavors because, as the saying goes, "eat, drink and be merry; tomorrow you may die." This seems extremely true today as luxury good sectors have seen unprecedented growth in the last few years, while jobs and investment in the elements of production continues to decline. It's amazing how little changes in 160 years.