Interventionism

The essence of the interventionist policy is to take from one group to give to another. It is confiscation and distribution.

Human Action, p. 851; p. 855

If all interventionist laws were really to be observed they would soon lead to absurdity.

A Critique of Interventionism, p. 30

Socialism and interventionism. Both have in common the goal of subordinating the individual unconditionally to the state.

Omnipotent Government, p. 44

Economic interventionism is a self-defeating policy. The individual measures that it applies do not achieve the results sought. They bring about a state of affairs, which—from the viewpoint of its advocates themselves—is much more undesirable than the previous state they intended to alter.

Bureaucracy, p. 119

Interventionism cannot be considered as an economic system destined to stay. It is a method for the transformation of capitalism into socialism by a series of successive steps.

Planning for Freedom, p. 28

The middle-of-the-road policy is not an economic system that can last. It is a method for the realization of socialism by installments.

Planning for Freedom, pp. 32–33

The effect of its interference is that people are prevented from using their knowledge and abilities, their labor and their material means of production in the way in which they would earn the highest returns and satisfy their needs as much as possible. Such interference makes people poorer and less satisfied.

Human Action, p. 736; p. 743

On the unhampered market there prevails an irresistible tendency to employ every factor of production for the best possible satisfaction of the most urgent needs of the consumers. If the government interferes with this process, it can only impair satisfaction; it can never improve it.

Human Action, pp. 736–37; pp. 743–44

But for the inefficiency of the law-givers and the laxity, carelessness, and corruption of many of the functionaries, the last vestiges of the market economy would have long since disappeared.

Human Action, No Entry; p. 859

If the State takes the power of disposal from the owner piecemeal, by extending its influence over production; if its power to determine what direction production shall take and what kind of production there shall be, is increased, then the owner is left at last with nothing except the empty name of ownership, and property has passed into the hands of the State.

Socialism, p. 45

Every step that leads away from private ownership of the means of production and the use of money is a step away from rational economic activity.

Socialism, p. 102

State interference in economic life, which calls itself “economic policy,” has done nothing but destroy economic life. Prohibitions and regulations have by their general obstructive tendency fostered the growth of the spirit of wastefulness.

Socialism, p. 424

It is indeed one of the principal drawbacks of every kind of interventionism that it is so difficult to reverse the process.

Socialism, p. 440

Every step which leads from capitalism toward planning is necessarily a step nearer to absolutism and dictatorship.

Omnipotent Government, p. 53