Actually, I think you are the one confusing Austrian economics use of "rational action" with something completely different; "wise action". In Human Action, Mises only claims that people act in the way they believe will best satisfy their preferences. Preferences might be short sighted (leisure) or even self-destructive (drugs), but they are still, for the most part, rational choices. The portion of capital that is spent, saved, or invested by people who are rationally weighing options and consciously making a choice far, far, exceeds that of the irrational actors (i.e. drug addicts, Miley Cyrus fans, etc.). So much so, the latter is almost irrelevant.

Also, Austrian economics is a theory of economics, not sociology. Granted, the two are related, but it’s a stretch to expect it to provide normative value in something as far afield as criminal justice.

Stupid regulation is costly when you consider it in the aggregate. A few cents for mandated fused plugs, a few cents for shutters, a few more for stress reliefs; times hundreds of millions of devices sold / year adds up. The real problem here isn't adding one new little rule requiring the use of fused plugs though, it's the thousands upon thousands of little rules that cruft up the inventive process over time that really hurt. Each little straw added to that proverbial camel's back makes it just a little harder for good products to get into the market. The steadily increasing likelihood of a non-compliance fine or lawsuit makes investors and entrepreneurs less willing to try new ideas and start new businesses too. Eventually all the small, agile, innovative companies get squashed and only the behemoths survive, to the detriment of all of us consumers. Look at any established and "well" regulated industry for anecdotal evidence of this (automobiles, railroads, drugs, telephone, etc., etc., etc.). Now compare those to largely "unregulated" industries (software, elective medicine(Lasic), literature, computers, electronics).

It's simple, fused plugs and shutters offer little real protection from electrical shock. On the other hand, GFCI and AFCI interrupts are very good at preventing shocks, even when someone is bound and determined to get themselves a Darwin award. These are required for all "wet" areas here and you can even install them, as I have, at the central breaker panel to cover the whole house.

Most of those requirements are covered by the National Electric Code, which is _largely_ the product of electricians and safety engineers (UL Labs for example). Crap like fused plugs is the products of politicians and trial lawyers. I'll stick with advice from the prior group, thank you.

>>However, if exceptional care is not taken then these storage and management costs can escalate until a substantial amount of the stored value is spent ensuring the continued survival of the commodity which stores that value.

The fed charges interest on money they create out of thin air. Since 1955, this interest has averaged around 5%, but it has been as high as 16.39% in 1981. Every dollar in circulation is a perpetual stream of profit to the cartel of banks making up the federal reserve system, for doing absolutely nothing. In contrast, bailment companies provide secure, and insured, storage of commodities and charge a fee around 1% of value for major customers. Why would anyone not prefer the latter?

>>...I am sympathetic to the gold standard I am not yet prepared to back a return to the gold standard for two (2) primary reason: First, it is impossible to know for sure who has already horded gold and where and in how much quantity. Thus, at least for the short term, it would open us up to outside meddling in our economy and money supply by alternatively hoarding or dumping of gold supplies until an equilibrium was reached. Second, there is not enough physical gold in existence to back every transaction which occurs in our global economy with a meaningful quantity of gold.

Granted, but you are arguing against a straw man. Most hard money advocates don't propose a return to a gold backed dollar, at least not right away. The first step would be to decriminalize the use of alternate currencies backed by commodities. You'd immediately see gold notes, silver notes, and a host of other currencies with all the benefits of a dollar, but without the fed tax. Over a period of years, decades maybe, demand for fed notes would wither as they continued to inflate the greenback into oblivion. At first, it would be painful to have to constantly check conversion rates, but this would pass soon enough. I'm sure technology would fill that void as your cell phone could provide real time market data anywhere. The price of an item would, one day, be shown as g-Au, g-Pt, g-Ag for grams of gold, platinum, or silver for example.

The worldwide supply of elements useful for representing wealth is surprisingly predictable. The point here is: hoarding doesn't work; it usually hurts the hoarder most. Consider too, no one has succeeded at "cornering the market" on a commodity used as currency. There are very powerful economic equilibrium forces that make it impractical.

>> ...the government exercises a great deal of control, by virtue of their monopoly on hard power (i.e. military might), over the money supply so any solution to the fiat money problems or even commodity money must involve the government at some level, unless one is advocating anarchy which I reject as unworkable.

I absolutely agree. To my reckoning, anarchists are actually more delusional than communists. At least communists can honestly say there has never been a real life test of communist theory (per Engels, Marx, etal). Anarchists, on the other hand, have lots of historical examples of what happens to people that don't organize enough government to at least provide a common defense. They get killed, pillaged, and conquered.