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Milton Friedman Quotes - Page 3

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You never can cure poverty. Poverty is in the eye of the beholder.

You never can cure poverty. Poverty is in the eye of the beholder.

Milton Friedman
Eye, Poverty, Beholder
Source: www.pbs.org

Fundamentally, there are only two ways of coordinating the economic activities of millions. One is central direction involving the use of coercion - the technique of the army and of the modern totalitarian state. The other is voluntary cooperation of individuals - the technique of the marketplace.

Milton Friedman
Army, Two, Liberty
Milton Friedman (2017). “Milton Friedman on Freedom: Selections from The Collected Works of Milton Friedman”, p.28, Hoover Press

The only reason there is a crisis about Social Security in the US and pensions in Europe and Japan is that you cannot maintain a "Ponzi" scheme indefinitely. We have collected from today's young to pay today's old and counted on tomorrow's young to keep doing so. That was a fine scheme as long as the number of young people was rising faster than old people. When that ratio comes to an end, such a system also has to end.

Milton Friedman
Japan, Europe, Numbers
Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

The world runs on individuals pursuing their self interests. The great achievements of civilization have not come from government bureaus. Einstein didn't construct his theory under order from a bureaucrat. Henry Ford didn't revolutionize the automobile industry that way.

Milton Friedman
Running, Government, Self
"The Phil Donahue Show", www.youtube.com. 1979.

I do not believe that the solution to our problem is simply to elect the right people. The important thing is to establish a political climate of opinion which will make it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing. Unless it is politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing, the right people will not do the right thing either, or it they try, they will shortly be out of office.

Milton Friedman
Believe, Office, People

We have a system that increasingly taxes work and subsidizes nonwork.

Milton Friedman
Lazy, Society, Liberty

Anything that government can do, private enterprise can do for half the cost.

Milton Friedman
Government, Cost, Half

The word 'free' is used three times in the Declaration of Independence and once in the First Amendment to the Constitution, along with 'freedom.' The word 'fair' is not used in either of our founding documents.

Milton Friedman
Independence, Three, Firsts

With respect to teachers' salaries .... Poor teachers are grossly overpaid and good teachers grossly underpaid. Salary schedules tend to be uniform and determined far more by seniority.

Milton Friedman
Teacher, Salary, Schedules
Milton Friedman (2009). “Capitalism and Freedom: Fortieth Anniversary Edition”, p.95, University of Chicago Press

The great advances of civilization, whether in architecture or painting, in science or literature, in industry or agriculture, have never come from centralized government.

Milton Friedman
Government, Civilization, Agriculture
"Capitalism and Freedom: Fortieth Anniversary Edition".

Hell hath no fury like a bureaucrat scorned.

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

There's no point in comparing an actual, operating system with an ideal system that doesn't exist.

Milton Friedman
Operating Systems, Compare, Ideals
Source: www.npr.org

If you cannot state a proposition clearly and unambiguously, you do not understand it.

Milton Friedman
States, Propositions, Ifs
Milton Friedman, Rose D. Friedman (1999). “Two Lucky People: Memoirs”, p.75, University of Chicago Press

Congress can raise taxes because it can persuade a sizable fraction of the populace that somebody else will pay

Milton Friedman
Taxation, Taxes Funny, Pay

There's no such thing as a free lunch.

Milton Friedman
Lunch Break, Economics, Ecological Crisis
1973 Lecture. The phrase is thought to have been coined anonymously, perhaps referring to the 19c US tradition of supplying food in bars to patrons buying drinks.

When a private enterprise fails, it is closed down; when a government enterprise fails, it is expanded. Isn't that exactly what's been happening with drugs?

Milton Friedman
Weed, Marijuana, Government

The real tragedy of minimum wage laws is that they are supported by well-meaning groups who want to reduce poverty. But the people who are hurt most by higher minimums are the most poverty stricken.

Milton Friedman
Hurt, Real, Law

The proper role of government is exactly what John Stuart Mill said in the middle of the 19th century in "On Liberty." The proper role of government is to prevent other people from harming an individual. Government, he said, never has any right to interfere with an individual for that individual's own good.

Milton Friedman
Government, People, Political
"Friedman & Szasz On Liberty and Drugs". Interview with Randy Paige on "America's Drug Forum", www.druglibrary.org. 1991.

When everybody owns something, nobody owns it, and nobody has a direct interest in maintaining or improving its condition. That is why buildings in the Soviet Union - like public housing in the United States - look decrepit within a year or two of their construction.

Milton Friedman
Years, Two, Political
Milton Friedman, Rose Friedman (1990). “Free to Choose: A Personal Statement”, p.42, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

The strongest argument for free enterprise is that it prevents anybody from having too much power. Whether that person is a government official, a trade union official, or a business executive. If forces them to put up or shut up. They either have to deliver the goods, produce something that people are willing to pay for, are willing to buy, or else they have to go into a different business.

Milton Friedman
Government, People, Different
"The Tyranny of Control". PBS "Free to Choose", episode 2, 1980.

What most people really object to when they object to a free market is that it is so hard for them to shape it to their own will. The market gives people what the people want instead of what other people think they ought to want. At the bottom of many criticisms of the market economy is really lack of belief in freedom itself.

Milton Friedman
Thinking, Giving, People

Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon in the sense that it is and can be produced only by a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than in output... A steady rate of monetary growth at a moderate level can provide a framework under which a country can have little inflation and much growth. It will not produce perfect stability; it will not produce heaven on earth; but it can make an important contribution to a stable economic society.

Milton Friedman
Country, Perfect, Heaven
"The Counter-Revolution in Monetary Theory". Book by Milton Friedman, June 1, 1970.

The problem in this world is to avoid concentration of power - we must have a dispersion of power.

Milton Friedman
World, Problem, Concentration
Milton Friedman - Big Business, Big Government, www.youtube.com. September 14, 2012.

Central bankers always try to avoid their last big mistake. So every time there's the threat of a contraction in the economy, they'll over stimulate the economy, by printing too much money. The result will be a rising roller coaster of inflation, with each high and low being higher than the preceding one.

Milton Friedman
Mistake, Trying, Bankers

Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon in the sense that it is and can be produced only by a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than in output.

Milton Friedman
Investing, Output, Rapids
Milton Friedman (1994). “Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History”, p.63, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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