Capitalism and Freedom by Milton Friedman

It is remarkable how rarely he supports any of his assertions with anything other than the boldness of his claims. Individuals are all that matter, while trade unions are an example of ‘collectivism’ and therefore enough to have him fuming and spitting fire. The only monopolies he was actually concerned about are those of trade unions. I was keen to see what he might say about monopolies – given he appears obsessed with ‘competition’ I thought he might discuss the benefits of anti-trust laws, for example. All other government activity (even printing money and registering doctors) is either fundamentally wrong and needs to be done by the private sector or should be presumed dangerous and in need of constant vigilance. Here we have a government whose sole role is supplying the police and army – both mostly to protect the interests of property. Neo-liberals and neo-conservatives will complain that Friedman’s ideas have never been fully implemented and that this is why we have so much trouble today – if you ever want to create a utopian vision splendid my suggestion is to follow Plato’s example in the Republic – make the society you envision so impossible to implement that your followers can always claim some vital element has been left out and so never properly applied. Even the so called ‘left’ – as in the Democrats in the US, the Labour Party in Britain and the Labor Party in Australia all look to ‘market-based’ solutions to problems. Should a theorist be held responsible for the consequences of their theories? If Marx is to be held responsible for Soviet Russia then Friedman is much more responsible for the state of current day America. He says the opposite, of course, but decades of the applications of his prescriptions have turned America into a grossly and increasingly unequal society.

Naturally, this freedom he is so fond of generally equates to a freedom for the majority to have less while the few are given much more. It is hard to imagine anything more mean-spirited than such a person.

He rails against equality as all liberals (in the traditional definition of that term) tend to. Friedman is only interested in what he refers to as freedom.

The French Revolution was fought under a flag of three colours and for three causes, Liberté, égalité, fraternité – Freedom, Equality and Brotherhood. If one needed proof that much of modern economics is an exercise in ideology and self-interested appeals on behalf of the obscenely wealthy then this book provides ample evidence. This book is an interesting case of modern day sophistry – where the worse argument is made to appear the better.

Capitalism and Freedom by Milton Friedman