'..it is not possible for a central banker to enact Austrian ideas..'

'..the entire crisis management has in the main pursued two major goals: to bail out insolvent banks with tax payer funds and money printing, and to keep the growth of governments intact..'

<blockquote>'We would note on this occasion that a recent UBS paper that argues that Merkel and Draghi are pursuing 'Austrian' policies is obviously quite mistaken about what Austrians would recommend. Austrian theory ultimately teaches that the free market is superior to all forms of central economic planning. While there has been the odd reform here and there that Austrians would in principle support (such as a liberalization of labor markets and repudiation of licensing restrictions), the entire crisis management has in the main pursued two major goals: to bail out insolvent banks with tax payer funds and money printing, and to keep the growth of governments intact, even while the private economy they are infesting with their depredations shrinks all around them. The only way in which the whole enterprise is slightly different from the same old Keynesian recipe that ruins major economies elsewhere is that it was decided that the pace of growth of deficit spending shall be slightly reduced so as not to bring down the wrath of the markets (public debts in the euro area meanwhile continue to grow at a quite unhealthy pace anyway).

So there is very little in this process that can be said to be in accordance with Austrian ideas. In fact, it is not possible for a central banker to enact Austrian ideas, except if he were tendering his immediate resignation while concurrently denouncing the existence of the central bank.'

- Acting Man, Italy to be Governed by Another ‘Technocrat’? March 7, 2013</blockquote>


'..and it is tax hikes and lack of labor reforms, not "austerity" that is wrecking Europe.'

<blockquote>The unfortunate thing in this mess is having to listen to Keynesian clowns shout "I told you so" regarding "austerity" when not a single Austrian economist anywhere would be supportive of these tax hikes (and it is tax hikes and lack of labor reforms, not "austerity" that is wrecking Europe).

- Mike "Mish" Shedlock, "Grillonomics" Is a Mess, March 05, 2013</blockquote>


'What Monti had done wasn’t real austerity, he said.'

<blockquote>Then he was talking with the tabloid Bild, the largest circulation paper in Germany—he’d become an equal opportunity mainstream-media darling. The Bild pushed him about Merkel’s demand that Italy continue on Prime Minister Mario Monti’s path of reforms and austerity. He brushed it off. What Monti had done wasn’t real austerity, he said. “Instead of taking something from the already privileged, particularly politicians, he helped himself to the savings of families who now, without this money, no longer know how they can go on.”

- Fear of Nuremberg Trials For Corrupt Italian Politicians, March 4, 2013</blockquote>


Context

<blockquote>The Unadulterated Gold Standard Part V (Real Bills)

Minimum Wage Damage in Thailand

'..avoiding a “secondary depression,” or for preventing the severity of one..' - Jesús Huerta de Soto

Marc Faber on “How Will The Money Printing Experiment End?”, March 1, 2013

Marc Faber worried about a Deflationary Collapse March 4, 2013</blockquote>