In a bureaucratic system, useless work drives out useful work. Milton Friedman More Quotes by Milton Friedman More Quotes From Milton Friedman Corruption is government intrusion into market efficiencies in the form of regulations. Milton Friedman market-efficiencyregulationgovernment 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 colorhatepeople Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself. Milton Friedman libertarianlibertyfreedom We have a system that increasingly taxes work and subsidizes nonwork. Milton Friedman lazylibertysociety Because it is one thing to have free immigration to jobs. It is another thing to have free immigration to welfare. And you cannot have both. If you have a welfare state, if you have a state in which every resident is promises a certain minimal level of income, or a minimum level of subsistence, regardless of whether he works or not, produces it or not. Then it really is an impossible thing. Milton Friedman impossible-thingsjobspromise One role of prohibition is in making the drug market more lucrative. Milton Friedman corruptiondrugroles Most economic fallacies derive from the tendency to assume that there is a fixed pie, that one party can gain only at the expense of another. Milton Friedman pielibertyparty There's no point in comparing an actual, operating system with an ideal system that doesn't exist. Milton Friedman operating-systemscompareideals 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 governmentselfrunning If you cannot state a proposition clearly and unambiguously, you do not understand it. Milton Friedman propositionsstatesifs You must distinguish sharply between being pro free enterprise and being pro business. Milton Friedman free-enterpriseenterprise Most of the energy of political work is devoted to correcting the effects of mismanagement of government. Milton Friedman cynicalpoliticalgovernment What works for Sweden wouldn't work for France or Germany or Italy. In a small state, you can reach outside for many of your activities. In a homogeneous culture, they are willing to pay higher taxes in order to achieve commonly held goals. But "common goals" are much harder to come by in larger, more heterogeneous populations. Milton Friedman populationgoalorder You know there are very few Marxists left in the world... they're all in American universities. Milton Friedman economicamericaworld 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 salaryschedulesteacher The unions might be good for the people who are in the unions but it doesn't do a thing for the people who are unemployed. Because the union keeps down the number of jobs, it doesn't do a thing for them. Milton Friedman numbersjobspeople 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 japannumberseurope Higher taxes never reduce the deficit. Governments spend whatever they take in and then whatever they can get away with. Milton Friedman get-awaytaxesgovernment Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program. Milton Friedman libertarianlibertygovernment The problem in this world is to avoid concentration of power - we must have a dispersion of power. Milton Friedman concentrationproblemworld
