Free Market Economics — Season 1, Episode 6: Mainstream Economics
Documentary, Talk • 49 min • 1 season, 10 episodes
Episode synopsis
In lecture six, we consider the work of mainstream economists outside the Austrian, Chicago, and UCLA Schools who contributed to free market economics and critiques of government regulation. We examine Robert Crandall’s work on pollution trading, Clifford Winston’s deregulation studies, Edward Glaeser’s housing research, Martin Feldstein’s tax analysis, Douglas Irwin’s trade work, Jagdish Bhagwati’s free trade principles, David Neumark’s minimum wage studies, and Michael Clemens’s immigration research. The lecture concludes with Thomas Sowell’s work on data analysis, wealth mobility, and individual choice, showing how economic research across diverse institutions highlights the benefits of free markets and the costs of government intervention.
About Free Market Economics
In Free Market Economics, Dr. David Henderson guides us through ten foundational pillars of economic wisdom and the major schools of thought—Austrian, Chicago, UCLA, and Public Choice. Along the way, we explore how markets coordinate through decentralized knowledge, property rights, and voluntary exchange, and why central planning so often falls short. Drawing on vivid historical cases—from the Soviet economic collapse to West Germany’s postwar miracle—the course brings core ideas like subjective value, spontaneous order, and entrepreneurial discovery to life. Ultimately, it shows how economic freedom and open inquiry fuel innovation and prosperity, while government intervention frequently produces unintended consequences and inefficiencies.