# trade cycle Summary::another name for the business cycle. More popularly, the [business cycle](https://www.freemarketcenter.com/lexicon/index.html#business%20cycle). The periodic rhythmical regularity of continuously recurring changes that are assumed to occur in aggregate economic activity. The phases of the trade cycle are loosely: a feverishly booming prosperity which ends in an acute crisis or panic; a period of liquidation, heavy unemployment and adjustment popularly known as a recession or depression; and a revival or recovery period that sets off an upsurge that leads to a new boom. [Karl Marx](https://www.freemarketcenter.com/lexicon/index.html#Karl%20Marx) (1818-1883) originated the idea that recurrent crises are inherent in the unhampered (free) market economy. [Mises](https://www.freemarketcenter.com/lexicon/index.html#Ludwig%20von%20Mises)has shown that "the trade cycle is . . ., on the contrary, the inevitable effect of manipulation of the money market." (The Freeman, September 24, 1951. 1(#26):829). See "Monetary theory of the trade cycle." [[Human Action - Mises (HA)]] 571-86. --- # References [[Austrian Trade Cycle]] [[Austrian Theory of the Trade Cycle and Other Essays]] [Discuss the Trade Cycle](obsidian://open?vault=Substack&file=Production%2FDiscuss%20the%20Trade%20Cycle) [[Discuss the Trade Cycle]]