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Resources

This page lists books, videos, and websites that can help you learn more about the free market and the role of government.

Introduction

  • The United States Declaration of Independence and Constitution will teach you the foundations of this country.
  • Learning about the economy is a must for any informed citizen. I recommend the book Basic Economics by Thomas Sowell. It provides an introduction to economics that is so easy and interesting. In addition to explaining concepts such as price, market, supply and demand the book uses these concepts to analyze real issues.
  • Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt teaches economic principles and the failures of government intervention.

Economics

  • Robert Murphy’s Choice: Cooperation, Enterprise, and Human Action provides an introduction to Austrian Economics which is one of the major economic schools advocating free market principles. The book is a modern presentation of the classic book Human Action by Ludwig von Mises. One of the main contributions of the Austrian school is the Business Cycle theory proposed by Mises which explains neatly the cycles of boom and bust that  happens because of central banks’ intervention in setting interest rates.
  • Murray Rothbard’s The Mystery of Banking provides an overview of both money and banks. The book teaches the origin of money, history of banking and central banks and the economic impact of different banking practices.
  • Milton Friedman’s Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History introduces some interesting lessons in monetary history and how unintended consequences of government action can cause disastrous effects.

History

  • Brion McClanahan’s The Founding Fathers Guide to the Constitution is a guide to the Constitution as written and ratified by the founding fathers. The book goes through the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and provides the discussions in the Philadelphia convention and the states ratifying conventions for each section.

Issues

The following collection of books will help the reader learn more about some of the hot political topics:

  • Thomas Sowell’s Economic Facts and Fallacies refutes a number of fallacies about race, gender, urban life, academia and the third world.
  • Richard Muller’s Energy for Future Presidents: The Science Behind the Headlines  presents the science behind energy in a simple way. The book explains the different sources of energy and the benefits and issues with each.
  • Thomas Sowell’s Wealth, Poverty and Politics: An International Perspective provides a global perspective on the wealth and poverty and demonstrates that equality is not the natural state of the world and that human choice and politics play a major role in creating wealth.
  • Alex Epstein’s The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels changes the discussion about fossil fuels. Most environmentalists attack fossil fuels because their claimed effect on the environment. Fossil fuel producers and advocates have been on the defense responding that fossil fuels are the only economic options and we have to mitigate the bad effects while renewable energy progress to take over. In that book, Alex Epstein goes in the offense and explains that the picture of a clean environment that the environmentalists defend is not true and that energy provided by fossil fuels allowed humans to adapt to the environment which is dangerous in its natural state.
  • Thomas Sowell’s The Housing Boom and Bust explains the reasons behind the housing boom in the last two decades and the bust of 2007 to 2009. The role government played in expanding credit to people who shouldn’t have credit to meet political goals created the bubble and the zoning laws in major urban areas such as California’s Bay Area contributed to raising home prices.
  • Thomas Sowell’s Black Rednecks & White Liberals provides an interesting study about race in the United States.
  • Thomas DiLorenzo’s The Problem with Socialism provides a reference to all the problems with socialism. This book has a lot of information that could be used in debating socialists and debunking their lies.

Websites

The following organizations are advocates for free market and limited government:

Videos