Friday, June 7, 2013

A Father's Wish

Warren Buffett's comment on class warfare triggered George Reismann to write an open letter. Until now, the letter has no response. 

On March 4 this year, CNBC’s interview with Warren Buffett showed his economic position. He admired Ben Bernanke and considered the latter’s action as a way out of the 2008 economic crisis. Economically, Warren Buffett is Keynesian in his outlook. 

This is unfortunate for his father, Howard Buffett was a convert to Austrian economic way of thinking. As a father, his desire was for his son to be acquainted with Murray Rothbard’s books and that’s why he he wrote this letter in 1962. He also expressed his willingness to recommend Rothbard’s books “to one or two colleges” he was slightly acquainted with.

What happened to those books sent to Warren Buffett? What do you think could have happened if Warren Buffett himself was converted to the Austrian school as his father? We don’t know. We can only speculate. Perhaps, he could have influenced his relatives and friends towards sound economic practice. Perhaps, he could have done more than that. He could have listened to a similar advice given by George Reismann to finance an intellectual movement by helping spread Austrian books in colleges and universities. Perhaps, such movement could spark an exodus from Keynesian way of thinking and the global economy at present would be in better shape. 

The CNBC interview showed that Warren Buffett remains positive about the American economy in the long-term. We just hope that billionaires like him would be converted to Rothbardian way of thinking. That would be a good indication of a possibility that the current path of global economy leading to destruction would change direction towards a more peaceful and prosperous world. 

Note: I forgot the exact date i first posted this article. I think it's first week of March.  

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