PFP280 | Hans-Hermann Hoppe, “Javier Milei” (PFS 2024)

This talk is from the 18th Annual (2024) Meeting of the Property and Freedom Society, Sept. 19, 2024 to Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024. This is an excerpt from the panel discussion on Sat. Sept. 21, 2024, "Dürr, Müller, Fusillo, Bagus, Hoppe, Roundtable: What to Make of Milei"

[arthurhomines]

Thanks mister Hoppe ! People should read Oscar Grau's articles about Milei !

[basiliosalinasfdez]

During the critique, there was time to tell several times what magic wand Hoppe would use, in this same situation, to convince an opposing parliament and an entire population

[gonzalonunez]

Milei has not deregulate as much as he promised because he has to deal with parliament and also consider that public employees and labor unions are very strong in Argentina. One of the main problems of libertarianism is that many of its premises are theorized on the "ideal world" and not in the "real world".

[akjfkgodel]

"I don't know much about Argentina" proceeds to know NOTHING about Argentina

[NChindas]

Professor Hoppe analyses the measures without knowing the context, which makes it a bad analysis. If Milei had applied everything that Professor Hoppe says on the first day, he would have been fired from the government after leaving behind hyperinflation and more than 90% of the population in poverty.

[offhandbloom]

"I don't know much about Argentina", oh it shows, believe me.

[carloscueli]

Most of his criticism insults the intelligence of even the most unsuspecting person. His criticism focuses on aspects that, as president, he cannot change without the support of Congress and, at times, the Judiciary. He seems to have a prejudice against our country, assuming that, like a banana republic, we have no separation of powers or a legal-constitutional framework; that we have a submissive population incapable of enduring poverty, and that the president has absolute or omnipotent power to do as he pleases.

He suggests that the government should disregard its obligations and stop paying the debt, considering it illegitimate, without taking into account the harmful effects this would have on the country risk, interest rates, and the value of the currency. Regarding the regulatory framework, his criticism is also unfounded, as much of it depends on Congress. Nevertheless, the Ministry of Deregulation surprises us daily by eliminating a regulation. Price controls are being gradually removed; even the one on private healthcare, which he mentions, is no longer in effect, and as is well known, the exchange rate control will be lifted once the Central Bank’s balance stabilizes. Regarding monetary policy, he makes a fatal mistake by disregarding the lags of monetary policy (monetary excess is not distributed uniformly across all sectors), and even in real terms, it is not true that the monetary base has increased during the new administration. Additionally, it is a serious error to use year-on-year inflation to assess the success of a government’s monetary policy that has not yet completed a year in office.

In summary, one could say that he ignores the timing of each measure in its specific context to meet the final objectives. It seems as if it makes no difference to him to deceive the Argentine people with a mega hyperinflation, a national bankruptcy with an explosion of country risk, rising interest rates, and an increase in the number of poor and indigent people, all in the name of closing the Central Bank and fulfilling the imperatives of anarcho-capitalist intellectuals.

[BTChanOSRS]

Milei is playing what his role allows, with a coalition government.

Sanitizing bureaucracy, toxic regulations and rebalancing budgets.

As benefits show up, he will likely go more libertarian thanks to more political power given by more votes.

I see online many libertarians missjudging what he can do now.

[carlosbriceno]

The fact that professor Hoppe start his talk saying that "There is nothing impressive about Milei speech" and also that he has "made thousands of better speeches than Milei" denotes some serious envy and bad understanding of what politics is all about. Terrible and wrong that professor Hoppe allow his emotions to speak for him. You can criticize but with logical arguments.

[MademoiselleRed]

I think the fact that WITHOUT knowledge of the context one could so freely criticize the first libertarian president for not making enough libertarian renovations when he hasn't finished his first year yet and he has the congress against him (and many things require congress approval) is sad.

[Austriaschoolfan]

Fortunately, Mr. Hoppe initially acknowledges that he has no idea what Argentina is like, which is evident, as it is clear that he is not aware of Milei's political achievement in getting a significant portion of the population to make a 180-degree ideological shift. It is not a small subject, that after had chosen an extension of Kirchnerism just four years prior, the argentinian electorate migrated in record time, not only to understand the ideas of freedom but also libertarian ideas. However, in a country with the characteristics and economic time bombs that Argentina still has, minimizing both the achievements but also the prudence and political strategies of Milei to prevent the country from exploding in his face, is, to say the least, a clear demonstration of a lack of clarity regarding three main issues: the idiosyncrasy that prevails among almost half of the population, the potential explosiveness that the previous government literally left activated in the macroeconomy; and an opposition that bets on the slightest mistake, regardless of whether the Argentine rescue fails.

A salutation from Mexico, where we are just heading in the same “road to serfdom” than Argentina.

[ArchiduquesaMA]

He has no idea about Argentina.
Someone remind this old man Argentina is a democracy with division of powers, Milei has done so much in such little time considering he has a tiny number of congressmen.

[jonasastrom]

I have no doubt that if Milei was elected as a dictator in a country with 0 debt, he would have done nothing Hoppe would disagree with

[wagnercarvalho]

As Professor Huerta de Soto said in one of his masterclasses here on YouTube, "Hoppe is not a saint of my devotion." And today I understand why, as an economist he is weak and as a politician he lives in an unrealistic idealism.

[akjfkgodel]

This men is delusional, he seems to forget that have separations of powers in Argentina

[dmvianna]

Milei declared himself a “philosophical anarcho-capitalist” and a “pragmatic minarchist”. This subtle distinction invalidates HHH’s presentation premise.

I think he’s getting old. He’s making the same kind of clumsy generalisations as Noam Chomsky did since the 1990s.

[fitojdj]

Hoppe has made several mistakes and seems unaware that Milei has submitted over 100, 000 resolutions aimed at reducing the size of the government, most of which have been rejected by Parliament. With only eight representatives in the legislative body, it's baffling that Hoppe speaks as if Milei has the unchecked power of someone like Maduro, capable of enacting any policy. Milei even put forward a list of 40 companies to privatize, yet Parliament only approved four. It's disappointing to see one of my intellectual heroes, who claims to have been in the field for a long time, making such rookie errors. I'm confident Milei is working on arranging a conversation with Hoppe to clarify the situation. Milei won’t let this misunderstanding stand.

[kuryenlaindia]

Most of his criticisms are based on inexactitudes and misinterpretations and some of the information he quoted is just wrong

[Master_Potaterchief]

This man doesn't know the level of complexity and putrefaction that exists in the Argentine economy. For example, about inflation, the previous government leaved a minefield: one of those bombs were assets issued by the previous government to the banks, which if there was an inflationary jump, they could request the value of the same adjusted for inflation, which involved the state printing a lot of money (remember that the previous government left 8% inflation per WEEK, so its a lot of printing!!!!). Milei had to arrange to dismantle all these assets but a bank (coincidentally, greatly benefited from the previous government) just canceled them and there was a jump in value in the exchange rate and Milei had to intervene the exchange market that week and managed to stabilize the economy again because it had quite a surplus. Added to this, a lot of journalists and media encouraged people dollars and sell pesos because they said the dollar would continue to rise (which did not happen). It is a very complex scenario, there is an entire system doing things to make Milei Fail and Milei is constantly dodging bombs. Milei is buying time anyways, but in 2025 there are legislative elections and 3 out of every 4 people are going to vote for Milei's party (that's what the polls say)...

[emmanuel]

I´m just getting to know Hoppe, bad way I guess, he is talking like J Milei has been in power for the last 123 years!!