For three amazing weeks, I had the privilege of joining three other distinguished Mannkal scholars on our mid-year American experience. As our new friends over there continue their summer adventures, I am now afforded the great memories of joining them for a glimpse into their lives and ideas about the world.
Before departing, I was rather unsure of how to explain to friends and family what this experience would entail. Was it a study tour, conference, internship or something else? Usually I went with, “a week in Vermont and two in Massachusetts”. It was crossing the Connecticut River from New Hampshire to Vermont where the camp intern cheerfully gave me the first answer: economics summer camp!
This description goes to the heart of what Milton and Rose Friedman’s Capitaf Colloquium is about. The couple purchased the property quite literally as their summer residence too, famously named after their book Capitalism and Freedom, written on site. Our days would start by waking up each morning for discussion in ‘Liberty Fund’ style, on a chapter or theme of Friedman’s works. These sessions were an enjoyable outlet for sharing ideas in an inviting manner for all to participate. Without shutting out the other side as we may be tempted to do in Australia, it was refreshing to hear young Americans deliberate about the topical issues of their society, such as gun control and health care.
Come the afternoon however, was where the camp part kicked in. We were treated to a thorough journey through Vermont with a daily road expedition. One day it was to experience enterprise in action, at the Goodrich’s Maple Farm and Ben and Jerry’s factory. We visited President Calvin Coolidge’s hometown of Plymouth and learnt about how he lowered taxes yet still raised government revenue by allowing business to flourish. I should also mention a trip across state lines to Hanover, where Dartmouth College was featured in the television accompaniment of Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose. Though if we weren’t off the Capitaf property we were still hitting the trails on the Gator XUV, before capping off our nights downstairs in the guest library, voluntarily discussing big ideas about liberty and markets.
Our time in Vermont flew by like a whirlwind, and soon enough we found ourselves on the AIER estate in Berkshire County, Massachusetts. Our American friend group doubled in size as AIER plays host to a comprehensive intern and graduate fellow program through the summer. It was our pleasure to stay for an albeit shorter ‘Australian winter’ program. I successfully negotiated my place at the graduate fellow table in the office, by paying the others off with in my honest opinion, the best ice cream in the world at Provincetown. The trade was worth it, as it was an even better chance to work in a space built on the exchange of ideas, uplifting each other in all of our individual research projects at our home institutions.
Left: Capitaf, Middle: Dartmouth College, Right: Hot Day in Hanover
Yet again, we were treated the following week to Ryan’s tour of the Boston Freedom Trail. I especially liked the field where Coase developed his theorem. It was here too where one of the American interns remarked how her summer at AIER had been just like an economics summer camp. Our two ‘summer camps’ show that many of our most formative experiences, need not be through formal education.
Beyond just how they spend their summer, our enterprising American partners benefit greatly from a diverse array of educational choices driven by the competition of ideas. Australia is relatively lacking in this choice, and it flows on that we are losing our competitive edge. Our government further stifles innovation through the immense regulatory burden placed on those who generate productivity, incomes and profits. I’m inclined to believe that government intervention only benefits those that know how to manipulate it; a conclusion I reached as the 36-hour return home from Hartford became 3 times as much for my suitcase, at the hands of the government-created airline oligopoly. It may manifest in a different way in Australia, but rent-seeking behaviour in America at least, leaves a taste of corn syrup.
CERI’s investment in young thinkers of Western Australia has incited something greater. This experience has allowed me to step back and decipher the mess of government in our two countries. However, what shall prevail, is the seeds of entrepreneurship sown through thoughtful deliberation and exchange of new ideas in New England.
