Milton Friedman on The draft and the volunteer army
This delay is fortunate because the conference report contains a “compromise” on armed-force pay scales that is a far greater threat to achievement of the bill’s objectives than the much-publicized Mansfield amendment. Yet it might have been overlooked in the rush to adjourn.
Context. From a September 1971 Newsweek column on the House-Senate conference report on the bill to extend the draft and pave the way for an all-volunteer armed force, written while the Senate had yet to vote on it. “This delay” is the Senate’s not yet having voted on the conference report. The “compromise” cut the pay raises for first-term enlisted men and officers below both the House and Senate bills; he argues that their underpayment, a result of the draft, is a major obstacle to recruiting volunteers.
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Milton Friedman, “The Draft Uncompromise” (Newsweek, September 6, 1971; reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, September 8, 1971, p. 31094, introduced by Representative William A. Steiger of Wisconsin under the header “[From Newsweek Magazine, Sept. 6, 1971]”, 1971), Congressional Record, September 8, 1971, p. 31094. https://miltonfriedman.org/quotes/conference-pay-compromise-greater-threat-than-mansfield-1971
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He also said
The amendment is very much in the spirit of the Bill of Rights, the first Ten Amendments to the Constitution. Their purpose was to limit the government in order to free the people. Similarly, the purpose of the balanced-budget-and-tax-limitation amendment is to limit the government in order to free the people, in this instance from excessive taxation. Its passage would go a long way to remedy the defect in our budgetary process. By the same token, it would make it more difficult for supporters of ever-bigger government to attain their goals.
Context. From Tyranny of the Status Quo (1984), written with Rose D. Friedman, discussing the proposed balanced-budget-and-tax-limitation amendment to the Constitution, a version of which the Senate passed in August 1982, and which would limit federal spending and taxes to the growth of national income.
Tyranny of the Status QuoBook, 1984, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Ch. 3 “Causes and Cure: Government Spending, Taxes, and Deficits”, p. 58 (with Rose D. Friedman)Checked against the sourceFind the bookOther costly social programs—welfare, job creation, health and so on in endless variety—were enacted for the noblest of motives. Yet, they have repeatedly failed to achieve their intended objectives.
Context. From a 1979 Newsweek column. The column is framed as a daydream: he imagines President Carter giving a televised talk, and everything inside the talk is his own recommendation voiced through that imagined Carter, not anything Carter said. From the imagined talk’s review of what the expansion of federal government since the New Deal had produced, after agriculture and housing.
What Carter Should DoColumn, 1979, Newsweek, June 18, 1979; reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, June 13, 1979, p. 14740, introduced by Representative G. William Whitehurst of Virginia, who cites “the June 18, 1979, issue of Newsweek”, Congressional Record, June 13, 1979, p. 14740Checked against the sourceRead the originalWe spend more per capita on medicine and health care by far than any other country. The major increase has come since 1965. And that’s because in 1965 the United States enacted Medicare and Medicaid. And that was a stimulus to greater spending.
Context. From a November 2005 interview with Peter Robinson, conducted for the World Health Congress and printed in the Hoover Digest as “How to Cure Health Care.” Asked why the share of national income spent on health care rises in every industrial country. He answers that people grow richer and live longer and that medical care is a good people spend more on as they do, but that the rise has been far greater in the United States.
How to Cure Health CareInterview, 2005, Interview by Peter Robinson for the World Health Congress, November 21, 2005; printed in Hoover Digest 2006 No. 4Checked against the sourceRead the transcript
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