The Theory of Money and Credit
By Ludwig Mises
Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973) first published
The Theory of Money and Credit in German, in 1912. The edition presented here is that published by Liberty Fund in 1980, which was translated from the German by H. E. Batson originally in 1934, with additions in 1953. Only a few corrections of obvious typos were made for this website edition. One character substitution has been made: the ordinary character “C” has been substituted for the “checked C” in the name Cuhel.
Translator/Editor
H. E. Batson, trans.
First Pub. Date
1912
Publisher
Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Fund, Inc. Liberty Classics
Pub. Date
1981
Comments
First published in German. Foreword by Murray Rothbard and Introduction by Lionel Robbins not available online
Copyright
The text of this edition is under copyright. Picture of Ludwig von Mises: file photo, Liberty Fund, Inc.
- Foreword
- Preface
- Introduction
- Historical Prefaces
- Part I,Ch.1
- Part I,Ch.2
- Part I,Ch.3
- Part I,Ch.4
- Part I,Ch.5
- Part I,Ch.6
- Part II,Ch.7
- Part II,Ch.8
- Part II,Ch.9
- Part II,Ch.10
- Part II,Ch.11
- Part II,Ch.12
- Part II,Ch.13
- Part II,Ch.14
- Part III,Ch.15
- Part III,Ch.16
- Part III,Ch.17
- Part III,Ch.18
- Part III,Ch.19
- Part III,Ch.20
- Part IV,Ch.21
- Part IV,Ch.22
- Part IV,Ch.23
- Appendix A
- Appendix B
- Bio
- Dem
Biographical Note
Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973) was the acknowledged leader of the Austrian School of economic thought, a prodigious originator in economic theory, and a prolific author. A library of his books would total twenty-one volumes if confined to first editions, forty-eight volumes if all revised editions and translations were included, and still more if the
Festschriften and other volumes containing contributions by him were added.
Von Mises’ writings and lectures encompassed economic theory, history, epistemology, government, and political philosophy. His contributions to economic theory include important clarifications on the quantity theory of money, the theory of the trade cycle, the integration of monetary theory with economic theory in general, and a demonstration that socialism must fail because it cannot solve the problem of economic calculation. Mises was the first scholar to recognize that economics is part of a larger science of human action, a science which Mises called “praxeology”.
Ludwig von Mises received doctorates in law and economics from the University of Vienna in 1906. In 1909 he became Economic Advisor to the Austrian Chamber of Commerce (comparable to the U.S. Department of Commerce). After serving in World War I, he became Professor of Economics at the University of Vienna and, in 1934, Professor of International Relations at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva. In 1945 he became Visiting Professor at New York University where he remained until his retirement in 1969. In a lecturing and teaching career that spanned many continents and more than half a century, Mises numbered among his students one Nobel Laureate, F. A. Hayek, two presidents of the American Economic Association, Gottfried Haberler and Fritz Machlup, and many other economists of international reputation.
His major works are
The Theory of Money and Credit (1912),
Socialism (1922),
Human Action (1949),
Theory and History (1957),
Epistemological Problems of Economics (1960), and
The Ultimate Foundations of Economic Science (1962).
Murray N. Rothbard, who wrote the Introduction, is Professor of Economics at the Polytechnic Institute of New York. He is the author of
Man, Economy, and State, America’s Great Depression, and many other books, essays, and articles.