Authors:

Milton Friedman Quotes

All Quotes Achievement Age Alcohol Army Business Capitalism Change Community Competition Concentration Country Currency Doubt Economics Economy Effort Euro Evil Federal Reserve Free Market Freedom Giving Gold Government Spending Great Depression Greed Growth Hayek Home Immigration Inequality Inflation Internet Judging Liberty Limited Government Losing Loss Military Opportunity Past Philosophy Politics Poverty Power Progress Prohibition Purpose Quality Reality Responsibility Running School Social Responsibility Taxes Today Trade Understanding Values Virtue War Wealth Welfare
A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both.

A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both.

Milton Friedman
Freedom, Equality, Degrees

When a man spends his own money to buy something for himself, he is very careful about how much he spends and how he spends it. When a man spends his own money to buy something for someone else, he is still very careful about how much he spends, but somewhat less what he spends it on. When a man spends someone else's money to buy something for himself, he is very careful about what he buys, but doesn't care at all how much he spends. And when a man spends someone else's money on someone else, he does't care how much he spends or what he spends it on. And that's government for you.

Milton Friedman
Men, Liberty, Doe

If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand.

Milton Friedman
Government, Years, Political

One of the great mistakes is to judge policies and programs by their intentions rather than their results.

Milton Friedman
Mistake, Judging, Politics
Interview with Richard Heffner on "The Open Mind", December 7, 1975.

The essential notion of a capitalist society ... is voluntary cooperation, voluntary exchange. The essential notion of a socialist society is force.

Milton Friedman
Liberty, Essentials, Libertarian
Milton Friedman, William Richard Allen (1983). “Bright promises, dismal performance: an economist's protest”, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Inc.

Government has three primary functions. It should provide for military defense of the nation. It should enforce contracts between individuals. It should protect citizens from crimes against themselves or their property. When government-- in pursuit of good intentions tries to rearrange the economy, legislate morality, or help special interests, the cost come in inefficiency, lack of motivation, and loss of freedom. Government should be a referee, not an active player.

Milton Friedman
Motivation, Military, Loss

The long-range sloution to high unemployment is to increase the incentive for ordinary people to save, invest, work, and employ others. We make it costly for employers to employ people; we subsidize people not to go to work We have a system that increasingly taxes work and subsidizes nonwork.

Milton Friedman
Long, People, Unemployment

Inflation is taxation without legislation.

Milton Friedman
Money, Taxation, Conservative

If you pay people not to work and tax them when they do, don't be surprised if you get unemployment.

Milton Friedman
People, Unemployment, Pay

Rapid increases in the quantity of money produce inflation. Sharp decreases produce depression.

Milton Friedman
Increase, Produce, Rapids
Milton Friedman (1994). “Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History”, p.277, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the problem.

Milton Friedman
Government, Liberty, Libertarian
Milton Friedman (1975). “An Economist's Protest”

The only corporate social responsibility a company has is to maximize its profits.

Milton Friedman
Responsibility, Social, Profit

Why have we had such a decline in moral climate? I submit to you that a major factor has been a change in the philosophy which has been dominant, a change from belief in individual responsibility to belief in social responsibility. If you adopt the view that a man is not responsible for his own behavior, that somehow society is responsible, why should he seek to make his behavior good?

Milton Friedman
Philosophy, Responsibility, Men
Milton Friedman, William Richard Allen (1983). “Bright promises, dismal performance: an economist's protest”, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Inc.

Inflation is the one form of taxation that can be imposed without legislation.

Milton Friedman
Business, Political, Taxation

You cannot simultaneously have free immigration and a welfare state.

Milton Friedman
Immigration, Welfare, States
"Milton Friedman, Immigration, and the Welfare State" by Kerry Howley, reason.com. June 10, 2008.

Since the 1930s the technique of buying votes with the voters' own money has been expanded to an extent undreamed of by earlier politicians.

Milton Friedman
Technique, Politics, Voters
Milton Friedman, Rose D. Friedman (1985). “Tyranny of the status quo”

The great virtue of a free market system is that it does not care what color people are; it does not care what their religion is; it only cares whether they can produce something you want to buy. It is the most effective system we have discovered to enable people who hate one another to deal with one another and help one another.

Milton Friedman
Hate, Color, People
"Why Government Is the Problem". Book by Milton Friedman, February 1, 1993.

How can thinking people believe that a government that cannot deliver the mail can deliver gas better than Exxon, Mobil, Texaco, Gulf, and the rest?

Milton Friedman
Believe, Thinking, Government
Milton Friedman (1975). “There's no such thing as a free lunch”, Open Court Publishing Company

The key insight of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations is misleadingly simple: if an exchange between two parties is voluntary, it will not take place unless both believe they will benefit from it. Most economic fallacies derive from the neglect of this simple insight, from the tendency to assume that there is a fixed pie, that one party can gain only at the expense of another.

Milton Friedman
Party, Believe, Simple
Milton Friedman, Rose Friedman (1990). “Free to Choose: A Personal Statement”, p.31, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

When you start paying people to be poor, you wind up with an awful lot of poor people.

Milton Friedman
Wind, People, Awful

We economists don't know much, but we do know how to create a shortage. If you want to create a shortage of tomatoes, for example, just pass a law that retailers can't sell tomatoes for more than two cents per pound. Instantly you'll have a tomato shortage. It's the same with oil or gas.

Milton Friedman
Oil, Law, Two

You cannot be sure that you are right unless you understand the arguments against your views better than your opponents do.

Milton Friedman
Views, Opponents, Argument

I would say that in this world, the greatest source of inequality has been special privileges granted by government.

Milton Friedman
Government, Special, World

There are severe limits to the good that the government can do for the economy, but there are almost no limits to the harm it can do.

Milton Friedman
Government, Limits, Economy
Milton Friedman, William Richard Allen (1983). “Bright promises, dismal performance: an economist's protest”, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Inc.

I am in favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for any reason, whenever it's possible. ... because I believe the big problem is not taxes, the big problem is spending.

Milton Friedman
Believe, Cutting, Thinking
"Conservatives Betrayed: How George W. Bush and other big government Republicans hijacked the conservative cause". Book by Richard A Viguerie, p. 46, 2006.

You May Also Like: