Prove Me Wrong

Privatization Works

Socialism Doesn’t

Wednesday - August 7, 2024

San Francisco

Walter Block

About the Event

The Bastiat Society welcomes Austrian Economics' legend Walter Block for an evening of exciting discussions, engaging conversations, and a presentation that will leave you wondering why anyone would support socialism to solve problems from environmental pollution to socioeconomic crises to building roads.

Professor Block draws on years of research and works such as: Defending the Undefendable, Free Enterprise Environmentalism, Water Capitalism: The Case for Privatizing Oceans, Rivers, Lakes, and Aquifers, and The Privatization of Roads and Highways.

Get the set of Dr. Block's books.

The Block Bundle:

Defending the Undefendable

Defending the Undefendable II

The Privatization of Roads and Highways

Event Schedule

5:30 - 6:00: Check in

6:00 - 6:30: Book Talk with Block

6:30 - 7:30: Privatization Works, Socialism Doesn't

7:30 - 7:45: Intermission

7:45 - 8:30: Special Presentation

8:30- 9:00: Book Signing

Enjoy a variety of delectable foods with refreshments during the event.

"If we as a society want to cure unemployment, raise real wages, and in other ways improve our economy, we will base public policy on private property rights, the non-aggression principle and the law of free association. In the free and prosperous society, everyone may do precisely as he pleases, provided only that he does not initiate violence against non-aggressors."

The Block Bundle

It is among the most famous of the great defenses of victimless crimes and controversial economic practices, from profiteering and gouging to bribery and blackmail. However, beneath the surface, this book is also an outstanding work of microeconomic theory that explains the workings of economic forces in everyday events and affairs.

"Looking through Defending the Undefendable made me feel that I was once more exposed to the shock therapy by which, more than fifty years ago, the late Ludwig von Mises converted me to a consistent free market position. … Some may find it too strong a medicine..." - F.A. Hayek

"Walter Block has assembled thirty chapters defending behavior that is probably offensive to most Americans, such as dwarf tossing and stereotyping, and many that are downright illegal, such as dueling and smuggling. Plus, he’s provided us with humorous cartoons at the end of many chapters. The bottom line message in Freedom in All Realms: Defending the Undefendable is that the true test of our commitment to personal liberty doesn’t come when we permit others to engage in those peaceable, voluntary acts with which we agree. It comes when we permit others to engage in peaceable, voluntary acts we find offensive." - Walter E. Williams

Walter Block’s remarkable new treatise on private roads, a 494-page book that will cause you to rethink the whole of the way modern transportation networks operate. It is bold, innovative, radical, compelling, and shows how free-market economic theory is the clarifying lens through which to see the failures of the state and see the alternative that is consistent with human liberty.

He shows that even the worst, off-the-cuff scenario of life under private ownership of roads would be fantastic by comparison to the existing reality of government-ownership of roads, It would save lives, curtail pollution, save us (as individuals!) money, save us massive time, introduce accountability, and make transportation a pleasure instead of a huge pain in the neck.

Because this is the first-ever complete book on this topic, the length and detail are absolutely necessary.

About Dr. Walter Block

Walter Block is the Harold E. Wirth Eminent Scholar Chair in Economics in the College of Business at Loyola University, New Orleans. He is also an Adjunct Scholar at the Mises Institute and the Hoover Institute. Block has previously taught at the University of Central Arkansas, Holy Cross College, Baruch (C.U.N.Y.) and Rutgers Universities. He earned a B.A. in philosophy from Brooklyn College (C.U.N.Y.) in 1964 and a Ph.D. degree in economics from Columbia University in 1972.

Walter Block is the author of over two dozen books. His most famous one, Defending the Undefendable (1976) – has been translated into over a dozen foreign languages. He has authored or co-authored Maturity Mismatching: Is this a legitimate banking practice? (2020), Property Rights: The Argument for Privatization (2019), Philosophy of Law: The Supreme Court's Non- Use of Libertarian Law (2019), Space capitalism: the case for privatizing space travel and colonization (2019), An Austro-Libertarian Critique of Public Choice (2017), Essays in Austrian Economics (2017), Water Capitalism: The Case for Privatizing Oceans, Rivers, Lakes, and Aquifers (2015), Toward a Libertarian Society (2014), Legalize Blackmail (2013), Defending the Undefendable II (2013), Religion, Economics and Politics (2013), and Yes to Ron Paul and Liberty (2013).

Block has contributed over 600 articles and reviews to scholarly refereed journals and law reviews such as the Journal of Libertarian Studies, the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics, the Review of Austrian Economics, the American Journal of Economics and Sociology, the Journal of Labor Economics, Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy and Public Choice. He has written several thousand op ed articles, newspaper columns, chapters in books, etc. He also gives numerous speeches to civic and educational institutions and appears regularly on television and radio. Block has encouraged the publications of his students which start out as term papers for his courses, over100 of which have appeared refereed journals.

Block's intellectual and academic career has prepared him exceptionally well to hold The Harold E. Wirth Eminent Scholar Chair in Economics, where his understanding of the business world and the important role of the private sector in economic development enables him and Loyola to play a major role in significantly improving the research about and the education of students in the practice of free enterprise economics.