Milton Friedman vs. Hillary Clinton
From Thomas Kuper at Human Events: "I thought it would be interesting to do a compare and contrast between a champion of the free market (Milton Friedman) versus a champion of government (Hillary Clinton)." Here are a few examples:
"The unfettered free market has been the most radically destructive force in American life in the last generation."
~First Lady Hillary Clinton in 1996 stating her troubles with the free market
"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, Wall Street Journal, May 18, 1961
"Too many people have made too much money."
~First Lady Hillary Clinton condemns the insurance industry, feeling it’s not fair that certain businesses are making ‘too much money’
"'Fair' is in the eye of the beholder; free is the verdict of the market. 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, WSJ, Mar. 7, 1996
8 Comments:
Wow, I love that last quote!
If "Fair' is in the eye of the beholder; free is the verdict of the market", according to Friedman then the market is free to demand fairness.
He who has the gold (or political power)...
The market can and government shouldn't.
The market accomplishes this voluntarily.
Government accomplishes this through force and coercion.
~ to loosely paraphrase Friedman.
bob wright, is there not formidable presence of force and coercion in the market that comes from individuals in the market?
I think that both the government and the market use force and coercion but in different ways.
"The market can and government shouldn't."
What ever happened to the words from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, "government of the people, by the people, for the people"?
NO! You are completely wrong anonymous. In fact, whenever blatant imbalances do occur that can be agreed upon as unfair it is almost always the fact that the market is not truly free.
For example, the high price of food can be attributed to government subsidies for ethanol to farmers.
The high cost of healthcare can be attributed to the fact that the healthcare market is not a truly free market. Essentially, a cartel of doctors and hospitals enact price controls on medical procedures.
Although it is true that the high price of oil has been driven higher by demand, it is also true that the majority of the world's oil production is controlled by a cartel of despots called OPEC. Again, a true free market does not exist.
The point is anonymous that if there ever is a condition in a market in which an individual is able to coerce the market to bend to his will then it is not a true free market.
There is a wonderful video on Youtube of Milton Friedman vs. Naomi Klein. It contrsts short clips of Milton Froedman against Naomi Klien clips.
A similar Friedman vs. Clinton would be devastating.
anon 12:38
Do you have a clear example of formidable force and/or coercion in the market that came from an individual?
Or, what is an example of non-voluntary market participation by wide swaths of American consumers?
i.e., no one forces anyone to shop at Wal Mart.
To create some sort of division between government and "the free market" is disingenuous. Think the government should stay out of the market's way? Then get the hell off my highways. Cartels pervert the market, machiavelli? Markets MAKE cartels. It's what they're best at. It's a nice cop-out that libertarians have: whenever markets produce undesirable results, it's because the market is not "free" enough. Cheap.
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