Liberty Matters: Deirdre McCloskey and Economists’ Ideas about Ideas (July, 2014)

• Donald J. Boudreaux (author)

The key issue of this Liberty Matters discussion is to try to explain why “the Great Enrichment” of the past 150 years occurred when and where it did. McCloskey argues that a fundamental change in ideas took place which raised the “dignity” of economic activity in the eyes of people to the point where they felt no inhibition in pursuing these activities which improved the situation of both themselves and the customers who bought their products and services.