Economic Sophisms

...more meat in our pantries original: "larders", more linen in our closets original: "wardrobes", and more firewood in our cellars.

Restrictive laws always lead us to this dilemma:

Either you admit that they produce scarcity, or you do not.

If you admit it, you confess original: "avow" by that admission that you inflict as much harm on the people as you possibly can. If you do not admit it, you are denying that you have restricted the supply and raised prices; consequently, you are denying that you have favored the producer.

What you do is either harmful or useless, injurious or ineffective. It can never result in anything useful.

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II.

OBSTACLE, CAUSE.

Mistaking the obstacle for the cause—or scarcity for abundance—is the same logical fallacy sophism original: "sophism"; a clever but false argument intended to deceive. seen from another perspective. It is worth studying this in all its forms.

Man is originally born with nothing.

Between this state of poverty and the satisfaction of his needs, there are many obstacles that labor original: "labour" allows us to overcome. It is strange to ask how and why these very obstacles to our material prosperity have come to be mistaken for the cause of that prosperity.

Suppose I want to travel a hundred miles. Between my starting point and my destination, there are mountains, rivers, marshes, thick forests, and bandits—in a word, obstacles. To overcome these obstacles, I must exert a great deal of effort; or, what amounts to the same thing, others must exert a great deal of effort for me, and I must pay them for it. It is clear that I would have been in a better situation if these obstacles had not existed at all.

On his long journey through life, from the cradle to the grave, a person needs to consume an enormous quantity of food original: "alimentary substances", protect himself against the harsh original: "inclemency" weather, and preserve himself from a...