Institutul Ludwig von Mises Romania
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„It will always be happening that new facts appear, which people have not
foreseen, and which cause them to say after the event that they would have acted
differently if they had known beforehand what was going to ensue. People cannot
take account in their economic activities of things that are unknown to them. We
cannot therefore blame the method of economic calculation of the capitalist
system, operating on the basis of the money prices of the market, for the fact that
the expectations of the economic subjects are occasionally disappointed subsequently by the occurrence of unforeseen events. In economic calculation regard is taken of the future configuration of conditions of supply and demand only
insofar as people foresee them, or think they can foresee them, in the present. It is
merely the expectations of the entrepreneur about the future which influence the
market situation of today and contribute towards the formation of today’s prices:
this applies particularly to the prices of means of production and of consumption
goods which do not perish rapidly.”
Ludwig von Mises : The Equations Of Mathematical Economics And The Problem Of Economic Calculation In A Socialist State, p.31