The Bitcoin Standard Podcast

Austrian school economist Per Bylund joins to discuss learning Austrian economics, and his free brief primer book: How To Think About The Economy.

References:

• Per Bylund's Mises Profile: https://mises.org/profile/bylund
• How to Think about the Economy: A Primer - Per Bylund - https://mises.org/library/how-think-about-economy-primer
• Per's website: perbylund.com
• How to Think about the Economy: A Primer on amazon: https://www.amazon.com/How-Think-about-Economy-Primer-ebook/dp/B0BB8N2L78/ref=sr_1_1

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This seminar discusses the problems of economic modeling, using examples from environmental, energy, and macro economics. Saifedean explains how his graduate school experience trying to model energy markets led him to appreciate Mises' calculation problem and the problems of complex quantitative predictive models. What are the problems with attempting to quantify economic and environmental impacts of different fuels? Are the models being applied to bitcoin mining useful? As these absurd models bring fear-mongering to bitcoin mining, will they change bitcoin, or will their flimsy foundations be exposed by the kind of people who like to use a technology built on 100% verification and 0% trust?

Links referenced:

• The Skeptical Environmentalist by Bjorn Lomborg
• Bjorn Lomborg on Twitter: @BjornLomborg
• The Bitcoin Standard Podcast episode Allen Farringdon’s Adventures with Fiat Intellectuals
• Dynamic stochastic general equilibrium modelling on the short-term impact of a vote to leave the European Union by HM Treasury
• Article explaining forecast failures by the Spectator

Enjoyed this episode? You can take part in podcast seminars, access Saifedean’s courses and read chapters of his forthcoming books by becoming a Saifedean.com member. Find out more here.

THE BITCOIN STANDARD TOOLKIT/SPONSORS

NYDIG - https://nydig.com

Cyphersafe - https://cyphersafe.io/

OKCoin - https://okcoin.com/

Nodl - https://www.nodl.it/

Coldcard - https://coldcardwallet.com/

CoinBits App - https://coinbitsapp.com/

April 27th 2022.

Without government who would build the roads? Should prostitution, speculating and price gouging be outlawed? In this episode Saifedean discusses these questions with eminent Austrian School economist Dr Walter Block. They cover fundamental issues in economics such as whether there is such a thing as a “public good”, whether economics is an empirical science, and whether it is ethical to outlaw “victimless crimes”. Dr Block also shares the story of he became a libertarian and Austrian economist, including the roles played by Ayn Rand and Murray Rothbard in his intellectual journey.

Resources

• Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
• Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt
• Dr Block’s paper “The Minimum Wage Once Again” debunking a well-known 1994 study by Card and Krueger.
• Mises Institute article “The Phillips Curve Myth” on the relationship between inflation and unemployment
• Dr Block’s book The Privatization of Roads and Highways
• Dr Block’s book Defending the Undefendable
• Principle of non-aggression explained on Mises Wiki
• List of Walter Block’s publications online
• Dr Block’s book Water Capitalism (2015)
• Saifedean’s first book, The Bitcoin Standard
• Saifedean’s second book, The Fiat Standard

In this episode Saifedean talks to writer and head of business development at Unchained Capital Parker Lewis about his Gradually, Then Suddenly series. They start by discussing Parker’s career in traditional finance during the 2008 financial crisis, and how discovering Austrian economics and bitcoin helped him to truly understand the workings of global finance. They then talk about the arguments of some of Parker’s well-known articles on topics ranging from why bitcoin can’t be copied to why bitcoin isn’t too volatile to why bitcoin can’t be banned. In the Q&A Parker discusses rumours that he will run for mayor of Austin and whether hyperbitcoinization will lead to US dollar inflation.

Resources

· A full list of Parker’s articles on the Nakamoto Institute website.

· Bitcoin can’t be copied

· Bitcoin is Not Too Volatile

· Bitcoin Cannot be Banned

· Vijay Boyapati’s article The Bullish Case For Bitcoin for discussion of bitcoin’s volatility.

· Saifedean’s first book, The Bitcoin Standard

· Saifedean’s second book, The Fiat Standard

· Parker on Twitter.

Enjoyed this episode? You can take part in podcast seminars, access Saifedean’s courses and read chapters of his forthcoming books by becoming a Saifedean.com member. Find out more here.

What is praxeology and why does it matter? In this episode, Conza, chairman of the Libertarian Party of Australia, joins us to discuss the theoretical foundations of economics. He explains why praxeology – the science of human action – provides the value-free framework needed to reason about economic questions, and how its method differs from that of physical sciences such as biology. He and Saifedean discuss how praxeology can be used to analyse topics such as minimum wage, inflation and pandemics, and why the contrasting methods used by quantitative macroeconomists are flawed. They also defend Hoppe's argumentation ethics: a proof that arguing against the Non-Aggression Principle is logically incoherent.
References

• Conza on Twitter.
• Conza’s blog (where all the best economics quotes live).
• Conza’s YouTube channel.
• Website of the Austrian Mises Seminar.
• Mises Wiki article on Mises’ Regression Theorem
• BBC video on minimum wage being ‘a hurdle’ for disabled people.
• Theory and History by Ludwig von Mises
• Konrad Graf’s paper on Action-based Jurisprudence (see page 29 for Graf’s proposed model of praxeology).
• Konrad Graf’s lectures on bitcoin.
• Economic Science and the Austrian Method by Hans-Hermann Hoppe.
• The Beef Initiative website.
• For a biography of the life of John Maynard Keynes see Keynes the Man by Murray Rothbard.
• Website of the Australian Mises Seminar.
• Website of the Libertarian Party of Australia.
• The Praxeological Science Group on Facebook.
• The Law by Frédéric Bastiat
• For a New Liberty by Murray Rothbard
• The Ethics of Liberty by Hans Hermann Hoppe
• Hans Herman Hoppe’s Four-Step Healthcare Solution.
• Saifedean’s first book, The Bitcoin Standard.
• Saifedean’s second book, The Fiat Standard.

Enjoyed this episode? You can take part in podcast seminars, access Saifedean’s courses – including his ongoing course ECO22: The Fiat Standard – and read chapters of his forthcoming book, Principles of Economics, by becoming a Saifedean.com member. Find out more here.