Murray Rothbard

collection

“War is mass murder. Conscription is slavery. Taxation is robbery.”

Austrian School economist Murray Rothbard believed the private sector could do anything the government does – only better. He didn’t just promote anarcho-capitalism. He began the entire movement, which in our humble opinion deserves a nice T-shirt.

The Murray Rothbard Collection

Picture an anarchist. Right away you will conjure up a vision of some red-mohawked terror wearing fraying black skinny jeans, a leather jacket with the logo of some terrible indie band safety-pinned to its back, and garish facial piercings. He’s preparing to throw a Molotov cocktail at a Tires Plus, the ultimate symbol of The System.

You wouldn’t picture Murray Rothbard, an ebullient Austrian School economist wearing a smile and a dandy bowtie. The founder of anarcho-capitalism spread his ideals through books and lectures rather than crudely fashioned incendiary devices, and we salute him for it.

Rothbard’s economic theories are uniquely accessible. Rather than smash readers in the face with wall after wall of statistical analyses, the New Yorker presented series of intuitive axioms which, if followed, lead to a stark conclusion: Our country needs a massive and opaque government about as much as a Tires Plus needs something hurled through its window.

Rothbard was a fierce proponent of the free market. He extolled self-ownership, private property, and the unequivocal dismantlement of the state’s monopoly of force. Rothbard believed the theory of egalitarianism to be trash, a gross defiance of natural order that would only effect social rot and statist control.

Was Rothbard’s ideal world a viable utopia? Taken to an extreme, probably not. There is surely some argument in favor of parents’ obligation to feed their children, and Rothbard’s solution to the homelessness crisis would strike even the least empathetic among us as unusually callous.

But Rothbard’s tireless defense of personal freedom has become more poignant than ever. In a decade when an enthusiastic gendarmerie is poised to curb stomp you for not wearing a surgical mask while you shower, a touch of counter-extremism is warranted. Our Murray Rothbard collection is resistance to state tyranny in the form of comfortable clothing.