Hayek, The Road to Serfdom—20th Session

Tuesday, November 24, 2020, 20th session

The Road to Serfdom Reading Discussion 20th Online Meeting: Mori, Gyesun, Kangyoung Lee, Taejun

Chapter 7: Economic Control and Totalitarianism

Planners who believe society should be run through the implementation of a plan say that their plans will be limited to economic matters and that political freedom will still be guaranteed. But economic matters and political freedom cannot be separated; the freedom to choose freely in economic life is itself political freedom.

Only when we can decide for ourselves what is more important and less important economically are all freedoms fully granted. The economic freedom that planners speak of, they say, gives us freedom by making those painful and unavoidable choices about our economic problems on our behalf. But that is not acting on our behalf; it is giving orders.

Those orders direct our private lives as consumers by controlling production, and in the end they lead even to directing the occupations of individuals, who are the agents of that production.

In the meantime, our society has pursued policies such as the minimum wage and real estate measures under the mistaken belief that social safety and peace can be maintained through economic policy. As a result, however, we are experiencing the closure of self-employed businesses unable to bear wage costs, the resulting decline in jobs, and the collapse of the middle class under predatory real estate taxes.

The author repeatedly explains that although people have thought political freedom could be separated from economic freedom, political ideology immediately manifests itself as an economic problem.

Anyone who would like to join the online reading group every Tuesday evening is invited to the open chat room at the link below.

https://open.kakao.com/o/gX3OIqtb

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Original title: 하이에크 <노예의 길>-20차

Author: Jayujuui Ipmun Dokseo Toron Moim

Date: 2020-11-24

Source: https://www.cfe.org/bbs/bbsDetail.php?cid=reading01&pn=7&idx=23277