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Milton Friedman on The Great Depression

It is ironic that the Great Depression was produced by government but was blamed on the private enterprise system.
Why Government Is the Problem
Journal article, 1993, Hoover Institution Press, Essays in Public Policy no. 39, p. 15
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  1. The elementary truth is that the Great Depression was produced by government mismanagement. It was not produced by the failure of private enterprise, it was produced by the failure of government to perform a function which had been assigned to it.
    Economic Myths and Public Opinion
    Column, 1976, The Alternative: An American Spectator, vol. 9
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  2. The Great Depression in the United States, far from being a sign of the inherent instability of the private enterprise system, is a testament to how much harm can be done by mistakes on the part of a few men when they wield vast power over the monetary system of a country.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Ch. 3 The Control of Money, p. 50
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  3. The Federal Reserve system had been established to prevent what actually happened. It was set up to avoid a situation in which you would have to close down banks, in which you would have a banking crisis. And yet, under the Federal Reserve system, you had the worst banking crisis in the history of the United States. There's no other example I can think of, of a government measure which produced so clearly the opposite of the results that were intended.
    Commanding Heights: Milton Friedman interview
    Interview, 2000, PBS, “The Great Depression,” interview conducted October 1, 2000
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