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

Milton Friedman

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Milton Friedman
Age: 94 †
Born: 1912
Born: July 31
Died: 2006
Died: November 16
Economist
Essayist
Statistician
University Teacher
Writer
Brooklyn
New York
Milton Fridman
Desert
Shortage
Economics
Libertarianism
Liberty
Economist
Politics
Charge
Political
Federal
Government
Libertarian
Sahara
Years
Sand
Federalism
Socialism
Charging

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Universities exist to transmit knowledge and understanding of ideas and values to students not to provide entertainment for spectators or employment for athletes.
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Freedom in economic arrangements is itself a component of freedom broadly understood, so economic freedom is an end in itself ... Economic freedom is also an indispensable means toward the achievement of political freedom.
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Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself.
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Every economist knows that minimum wages either do nothing or cause inflation and unemployment. That's not a statement, it's a definition.
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Our emphasis here is based not only on the growing seriousness of drug-related crimes, but also on the belief that relieving our police and our courts from having to fight losing battles against drug use will enable their energies and facilities to be devoted more fully to combating other forms of crime.
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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.
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The central banks cannot control interest rates. That's a mistake. They can control a particular rate, such as the Federal Funds rate, if they want to, but they can't control interest rates.
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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.
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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.
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The heart of the liberal philosophy is a belief in the dignity of the individual, in his freedom to make the most of his capacities and opportunities according to his own lights.
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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.
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The big problem for a democratic government - democrat with a small d - is how to hold down government spending.
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What does it mean to say that government might have a responsibility? Government can't have a responsibility any more than the business can. The only entities which can have responsibilities are people.
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The Federal Reserve the privately owned U.S. central bank definitely caused The Great Depression by contracting the amount of currency in circulation by one third from 1929 to 1933.
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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.
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There is only one social responsibility of business
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The euro is going to be a big source of problems, not a source of help.
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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?
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Germany's problem, in part, is that it went into the euro at the wrong exchange rate that overvalued the deutsche mark.
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Inflation is the one form of taxation that can be imposed without legislation.
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