Milton Friedman on The free society
The liberal conceives of men as imperfect beings. He regards the problem of social organization to be as much a negative problem of preventing 'bad' people from doing harm as of enabling 'good' people to do good; and, of course, 'bad' and 'good' people may be the same people, depending on who is judging them.
Capitalism and Freedom
Book, 1962, Ch. 1 The Relation Between Economic Freedom and Political Freedom, p. 12
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The power to do good is also the power to do harm; those who control the power today may not tomorrow; and, more important, what one man regards as good, another may regard as harm.
Capitalism and FreedomBook, 1962, Introduction, p. 3Not yet checkedOur problems have arisen from good people who are trying to do good, but trying to do good in a fundamentally flawed way. The welfare state is in many ways a noble construct, a noble concept. It's the concept that we ought to help our fellow men. What flaws it is that it's one thing for you to help me out of your pocket. It's another thing for you to help me out of his pocket. And the fundamental flaw of the welfare state, in my opinion, is the idea that you should do good with somebody else's money.
The Open MindInterview, 1977, The Open Mind, hosted by Richard Heffner, Episode “A Nobel Laureate on the American Economy” (May 3, 1977)Checked against the sourceWatch itThe nineteenth-century liberal regarded an extension of freedom as the most effective way to promote welfare and equality; the twentieth-century liberal regards welfare and equality as either prerequisites of or alternatives to freedom.
Capitalism and FreedomBook, 1962, Introduction, p. 5Not yet checked
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