I havent read Hayek in ages either but the Road to Serfdom in spite of its name was less laissez faire than some of his later work but as I recall even later he was critical of those who thought you could create a well functioning market system just by the sort of shock treatment technique that some recommended.
Cheers, k hanly
Blog: http://kenthink7.blogspot.com/index.html Blog: http://kencan7.blogspot.com/index.html
--- On Mon, 10/5/09, Michael Pollak <mpollak at panix.com> wrote:
> From: Michael Pollak <mpollak at panix.com>
> Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Friedrich Hayek on National Health Care
> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> Date: Monday, October 5, 2009, 12:30 PM
>
> On Mon, 5 Oct 2009, ken hanly wrote:
>
> > In The Constitution of Liberty, Hayek
> argues against a "free" universal state health care system:
> >
> > http://www.qando.net/?p=3767
>
> > In The Constitution of Liberty, Hayek argues against a
> "free" universal state health care system:
> >
> > http://www.qando.net/?p=3767
>
> Great cite. Well that finishes that man bites dog
> story. It looks like Hayek essentially repented of his
> brief flash of insight in the Road to Serfdom (that free
> health care doesn't incentivize people to get meningitis)
> because it was ungenial to his prejudices. And 16
> years later he threw everything at it he could, scattershot
> style, just like a contemporary conservative would.
>
> I have only the most superficial acquaintance with Hayek,
> but my impression is that in _Road to Serfdom_ he came out
> and said he wasn't 100% behind laissez-faire. Perhaps
> that's why Mises called him a socialist?
>
> Is the rest of this later, book _The Constitution of
> Liberty_, less famous but seemingly not less important to
> him, an attempt in general to reverse that position and toe
> the libertarian party line on adulating laissez-faire?
>
> Michael
>
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