Executive Summary:
This page identifies some of Steve Hanke’s important writings on free-market economics. It curates books, papers, and commentaries where Hanke develops his “rules-first” approach to markets, money, and policy. Each entry includes a citation, a brief summary of the work’s main argument, and an explanation of how it illustrates Hanke’s free-market philosophy.
- Hanke, Steve H. & Matt Sekerke (2023). Making Money Work: How to Rewrite the Rules of Our Financial System. Making Money Work is a data-driven manifesto arguing that U.S. economic policy should once again center on the money supply rather than just interest rates. Hanke and Sekerke contend that post-2020 Fed policy and heavy-handed regulation have “strangled” banks and destabilized prices, and they propose rule-based monetary frameworks that empower broad-money creation by commercial banks. The book exemplifies Hanke’s free-market view by treating money as a market institution and by recommending institutional reforms (e.g. bank regulation, currency pegs) to stabilize prices.
- Hanke, Steve H. & Kurt Schuler (2021). Currency Boards for Developing Countries: A Handbook (Revised ed.). Originally published in 1994, this authoritative handbook (revised 2015/2021) systematically explains how to implement currency boards in weak economies. It provides technical analysis and policy guidance on pegs, fiscal discipline, and legal frameworks needed to enforce a fixed exchange rate. This book is central to Hanke’s free-market agenda because it treats a currency board as a market-anchoring institution that insures credibility and forces governments to follow disciplined fiscal and monetary rules (see case study of Hong Kong).
- Hanke, Steve H. & Stephen J. K. Walters (1997). Economic Freedom, Prosperity, and Equality: A Survey. This peer-reviewed article surveys empirical research on economic freedom and outcomes. It argues that greater economic freedom (markets, trade, stable money) correlates with higher growth and lower poverty. In Hanke’s free-market framework, this work provides evidence that market institutions and property rights (the foundation of “liberty, equality, prosperity”) indeed produce better economic results.
- Hanke, Steve H. (ed.) (1987). Privatization and Development. San Francisco: ICS Press (International Center for Economic Growth). This edited volume connects privatization to positive free-market outcomes by focusing on how shifting assets and services from government control to public ownership improves competition, and contracting can improve incentives and the performance of entire industries. It forms an important part of Hanke’s free-market framework philosophy as, under Hanke’s doctrine, privatisation is a core tenet of enabling better outcomes in the free market.
- Hanke, Steve H. (2024). A Synopsis of Prof. Hanke’s Activities in the Water Resource Field: Selected Publications and Brief Comments (Studies in Applied Economics, SAE./No.251/January 2024). This short working paper is a selected bibliography designed to frame and organize Hanke’s water-resource work since 1967, documenting his work operating at the intersection of economics and engineering. It groups accessible items from a much larger body of publications into five themes (water demand, conservation, costing/pricing, benefit-cost analysis, and White House water policy) and briefly explains what each strand contributed. For free-market economics, it shows Hanke applying market principles to infrastructure in his time on President Reagan’s board of economic advisors.
Related Pages
- Principles of Free Market Economics
- Intellectual Roots
- Privatisation and Property Rights
- Money as a Free-Market Institution
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