“Since 1918, practically all indicators of high or rising time preferences have exhibited a systematic upward tendency: as far as government is concerned, democratic republicanism produced communism (and with this public slavery and government sponsored mass murder even in peacetime), fascism, national socialism and, lastly and most enduringly, social democracy (“liberalism”). Compulsory military service has become almost universal, foreign and civil wars have increased in frequency and in brutality, and the process of political centralization has advanced further than ever before.”
Recorded at the Mises Institute’s “Costs of War” conference in May 1994 in Auburn, Alabama: https://mises.org/library/the-costs-war
Hans-Hermann Hoppe, an Austrian School economist and libertarian/anarcho-capitalist philosopher, is Professor Emeritus of Economics at UNLV, Distinguished Senior Fellow with the Mises Institute, founder and president of The Property and Freedom Society, former editor of the Journal of Libertarian Studies, and a lifetime member of the Royal Horticultural Society. He is married to economist Dr. A. Gulcin Imre Hoppe and resides with his wife in Istanbul.