The wit and wisdom of Bastiat

Boston Globe ^ | 12/9/2001 | Jeff Jacoby

[sourcery]

CONOMICS AND BRILLIANT WIT do not usually go hand in hand, but in a hilarious piece of satire, a French economist has published a devastating rebuttal to all the industries that plead for government protection from competitors' lower prices. If you've ever been seduced by the anticompetitive laments of the steel lobby or the dairy farmers, you owe it to yourself to take a look at this marvelous spoof.

[XLurk]

THIS was actually published in the Boston Globe?
I am stunned.

[Vigilanteman]

Bastiat is an incredibly brilliant and timeless economist. My favorite work of his is The Law, published in the same year as Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto. The later is studied and often advocated at every center of learning. The former remains virtually ignored by all but the most conservative educators.

If every high school student and college freshman was to give them equal time and study, there would be monuments to Bastiat in every major plaza within a generation and Marx would join the Thugee religion to the nethermost regions of history's trash heap.

[jackbob]

Bastiat is the only political economy writer that for the most part can be easily understood by a 7th grader. I do not think The Law is even close to being his best work. It lacks the humor found in the rest of his writings. Its also to dry, and not a good representation of his witty explanations of market political economics. At any rate, Bastiat gets my vote as the best writer of basic libertarian argument of all time.

[connectthedots]

Read The Law. You will not regret it and will want to spead it its message far and wide.

[Vigilanteman]

The Law is not his most fun-to-read work. And, granted, a 7th grader in our modern publik school system might have a hard time with it. By college, however, they should be able to comprehend.

Unlike the Communist Manifesto, it has its witty places, but it is a serious work.

It's a damn shame Bastiat died at such a young age. He was to economics what Mozart was to music-- a brilliant shining star while he lasted.

The one thing few will disagree with is that he ought to be studied by every student in the free world.