Ludwig von Mises was one of the greatest economists and a social philosopher. He is known as the founder of the "neo-Austrian School" of economics. He authored a number of books on economics including Human Action and The Theory of Money and Credit.
The business cycle theory of Ludwig von Mises explained that the inflation and depressions are caused by inflationary bank credit encouraged by Central Banks which was acknowledged and adopted by most young economists in England as the best explanation of the Great Depression of the 1930s.
His quotes give insights into the principles of Austrian economics. These quotes will help you in understanding about money and investing.
1. Fiat money is a money consisting of mere tokens which can neither be employed for any industrial purposes nor convey a claim against anybody.
2. For the naive mind there is something miraculous in the issuance of fiat money. A magic word spoken by the government creates out of nothing a thing which can be exchanged against any merchandise a man would like to get. How pale is the art of sorcerers, witches, and conjurors when compared with that of the government’s Treasury Department!
3. The material of which commodity money is made must have the same value whether it is used as money or otherwise. Whether a change in the value of gold originates in its employment as money or in its employment as a commodity, in either case the value of the whole stock changes uniformly.
4. The fact that the law regards money only as a means of canceling outstanding obligations has important consequences for the legal definition of money. What the law understands by money is in fact not the common medium of exchange but the legal medium of payment. It does not come within the scope of the legislator or jurist to define the economic concept of money.
5. The valuation of the monetary unit depends not upon the wealth of the country, but upon the ratio between the quantity of money and the demand for it, so that even the richest country may have a bad currency and the poorest country a good one.
6. If you increase the quantity of money, you bring about the lowering of the purchasing power of the monetary unit.
7. No increase in the welfare of the members of a society can result from the availability of an additional quantity of money.
8. The characteristic feature of capitalism that distinguishes it from pre-capitalist methods of production was its new principle of marketing. Capitalism is not simply mass production, but mass production to satisfy the needs of the masses.
9. Capitalism or market economy is that system of social cooperation and division of labor that is based on private ownership of the means of production.
10. What people today call inflation is not inflation, i.e., the increase in the quantity of money and money substitutes, but the general rise in commodity prices and wage rates which is the inevitable consequence of inflation. This semantic innovation is by no means harmless.
