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Milton Friedman on concentrated power and tyranny

Friedman's warning that combining economic and political power in the same hands is a recipe for tyranny.

43 passages in the archive29 checked against the source14 not yet checked
  1. As Adam Smith once said, 'There is much ruin in a nation'. Our basic structure of values and the interwoven network of free institutions will withstand much. I believe that we shall be able to preserve and extend freedom despite the size of the military programs and despite the economic powers already concentrated in Washington. But we shall be able to do so only if we awake to the threat that we face, only if we persuade our fellowmen that free institutions offer a surer, if perhaps at times a slower, route to the ends they seek than the coercive power of the state. The glimmerings of change that are already apparent in the intellectual climate are a hopeful augury.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Ch. 13 Conclusion, 2002 edition, p. 202
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  2. The affirmative-action program is one of those bureaucratic monstrosities that have become all too familiar: noble objectives, ignoble results.
    Bureaucracy Scorned
    Column, 1975, Newsweek (December 29, 1975); reprinted in full in the Congressional Record, Senate, August 26, 1976, p. 28015, under the heading “[From Newsweek, Dec. 29, 1975]”, introduced by Senator Mark Hatfield. Later collected in Bright Promises, Dismal Performance: An Economist’s Protest (1983)., Congressional Record, August 26, 1976, p. 28015
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  3. The key question is, therefore, whether it is feasible to man the Vietnam war with volunteers. I believe the answer is, Yes. Will it be easy to do so? The answer is clearly, No. But that is hardly decisive. The aim of national policy should not be to make life easy for government officials, whether civilian or military.
    No Draftees to Vietnam
    Column, 1968, Newsweek (December 30, 1968); reprinted in full in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, January 16, 1969, pp. 1161 to 1162, introduced by Representative Henry B. Gonzalez as “Mr. Friedman’s column, from the December 30, 1968, issue of Newsweek”, Congressional Record, January 16, 1969, p. 1161
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  4. It sounds fine. But it so happens that I read Bellamy during the 1930s. What struck me most forcibly about his “industrial army” was its uncanny resemblance to the Hitler Jugend—battalions of happy blue-eyed Aryans marching off with shovels on their shoulders singing “Deutschland über alles.”
    Universal National Service
    Column, 1979, Newsweek (1979); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, May 15, 1979, p. 11349, introduced by Representative Ron Paul of Texas, who says Friedman “recently” made these arguments “in Newsweek.” The reprint gives no issue date and omits part of the opening paragraph, Congressional Record, May 15, 1979, p. 11349
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  5. It might even occur to someone how much better off we were before we had a Department of Energy.
    Blaming the Obstetrician
    Column, 1979, Newsweek (June 4, 1979); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, June 7, 1979, pp. 14007 to 14008, introduced by Representative G. William Whitehurst of Virginia, who describes it as “an article by Milton Friedman, which appeared in the June 4, 1979, issue of Newsweek”, Congressional Record, June 7, 1979, pp. 14007 to 14008
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  6. In a reaction that has become only too familiar, the big-government coalition has been threatening dire consequences if Jarvis-Gann passes: police and fire departments “crippled,” bond issues in “default,” “bankrupt schools.” The opposition is preparing to launch a major media blitz to be financed in large part by big business, which apparently has let fear of Sacramento trigger its unerring instinct for self-destruction.
    A Progress Report
    Column, 1978, Newsweek (April 10, 1978); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, April 4, 1978, pp. 8709 to 8710, introduced by Representative John H. Rousselot of California, who describes it as “his byline article which appeared in the April 10, 1978 issue of Newsweek”, Congressional Record, April 4, 1978, pp. 8709 to 8710
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  7. The big difference between government coercion and private markets is that government can use coercion to make an exchange in which A benefits and B loses. But in the market, if A and B come to a voluntary agreement, it's because both of them are better off.
    Commanding Heights: Milton Friedman interview
    Interview, 2000, PBS, “The Economic Logic Behind Black Markets,” interview conducted October 1, 2000
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  8. Just as intellectuals bear major responsibility for instilling the view that big government is Santa Claus, so they can do more than any others to drive home the lesson that big government is really Frankenstein.
    Bureaucracy Scorned
    Column, 1975, Newsweek (December 29, 1975); reprinted in full in the Congressional Record, Senate, August 26, 1976, p. 28015, under the heading “[From Newsweek, Dec. 29, 1975]”, introduced by Senator Mark Hatfield. Later collected in Bright Promises, Dismal Performance: An Economist’s Protest (1983)., Congressional Record, August 26, 1976, p. 28015
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  9. Gammon’s theory is more than a smart-aleck curiosity. It is a direct consequence of the pursuit by all of us of our self-interest. In a market, we can pursue our self-interest only by persuading people to buy what we have to sell, hence we are driven to serve our customers’ interests. In a government bureaucracy that is exempt from competition, the customers have nowhere else to go. Their interests are largely irrelevant. Hence, the bureaucrat can serve his self-interest at their expense by expanding his empire and reducing his workload.
    Gammon’s “Black Holes”
    Column, 1977, Newsweek (1977); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, November 30, 1977, p. 38195, introduced by Representative John Ashbrook of Ohio as “Mr. Friedman’s article on Gammon’s theory of bureaucratic displacement as it appeared in Newsweek.” The reprint gives no issue date, Congressional Record, November 30, 1977, p. 38195
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  10. Child care? Program trading? Earthquakes? Pass a law. And every law comes with a price tag and is cited as a reason for higher taxes.
    We Have Socialism, Q.E.D.
    Column, 1989, The New York Times, December 31, 1989, Section 4, p. 11
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  11. A clearer example for the U.S. is schooling, which is predominantly governmental, as health care is in Britain, and where the law of bureaucratic displacement has been proceeding apace.
    Gammon’s “Black Holes”
    Column, 1977, Newsweek (1977); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, November 30, 1977, p. 38195, introduced by Representative John Ashbrook of Ohio as “Mr. Friedman’s article on Gammon’s theory of bureaucratic displacement as it appeared in Newsweek.” The reprint gives no issue date, Congressional Record, November 30, 1977, p. 38195
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  12. The combination of economic and political power in the same hands is a sure recipe for tyranny.
    Free to Choose
    Book, 1980, “Introduction”, p. 3
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  13. Concentrated power is not rendered harmless by the good intentions of those who create it.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Ch. 13 Conclusion, p. 201
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  14. You cannot explain those activities of government, and there are hundreds more, as reflecting the will of "we the people." They reflect a system in which concentrated vested interests have been able to obtain great power and impose costs on a diffused consumer interest.
    Interview with Milton Friedman
    Interview, 1992, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, The Region, Interview by David Levy, June 1, 1992
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  15. Equally important, you cannot spend somebody else's money unless you first get it. … So the concept of doing good with somebody else's money has force or coercion built into it as an essential feature.
    The Open Mind
    Interview, 1977, The Open Mind, hosted by Richard Heffner, Episode “A Nobel Laureate on the American Economy” (May 3, 1977)
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  16. The fault is not with the people who run the system, but with the system itself. More fundamentally, the fault is with those of us who are responsible for replacing the economic market with the political market.
    Gammon’s “Black Holes”
    Column, 1977, Newsweek (1977); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, November 30, 1977, p. 38195, introduced by Representative John Ashbrook of Ohio as “Mr. Friedman’s article on Gammon’s theory of bureaucratic displacement as it appeared in Newsweek.” The reprint gives no issue date, Congressional Record, November 30, 1977, p. 38195
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  17. 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 co-operation of individuals—the technique of the market place.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Ch. 1 The Relation Between Economic Freedom and Political Freedom, pp. 12-13
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  18. Dr. Max Gammon, a British physician, recently completed a five-year study of the British health system. In reporting his findings, Gammon was led to formulate a brilliant extension of one of C. Northcote Parkinson’s famous laws.
    Gammon’s “Black Holes”
    Column, 1977, Newsweek (1977); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, November 30, 1977, p. 38195, introduced by Representative John Ashbrook of Ohio as “Mr. Friedman’s article on Gammon’s theory of bureaucratic displacement as it appeared in Newsweek.” The reprint gives no issue date, Congressional Record, November 30, 1977, p. 38195
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  19. Abraham Lincoln talked about a government of the people, by the people, for the people. Today, we have a government of the people, by the bureaucrats, for the bureaucrats, including in the bureaucrats the elected members of Congress because that has become a bureaucracy too.
    Interview with Milton Friedman
    Interview, 1992, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, The Region, Interview by David Levy, June 1, 1992
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  20. How can thinking people believe that a government that cannot deliver the mail can deliver gas better than Exxon, Mobil, Texaco, Gulf and the rest?
    FEO and the Gas Lines
    Column, 1974, Newsweek, March 4, 1974; reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, February 27, 1974, pp. 4559 to 4560, introduced by Representative John H. Rousselot of California, who gives it as the column of “Newsweek columnist, Dr. Milton Friedman, in the March 4, 1974, issue”; reprinted again in Extensions of Remarks, April 30, 1974, p. 12454, by Representative Steven D. Symms, from The Freeman (Foundation for Economic Education), Congressional Record, February 27, 1974, p. 4560
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  21. Guerrilla warfare from outside and inside the country has produced a reaction by the government that can properly be described as repressive. But the provocation has clearly been great and it is important to maintain a sense of proportion.
    Rhodesia
    Column, 1976, Newsweek, May 3, 1976; reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, April 29, 1976, pp. 11979 to 11980, introduced by Representative John Ashbrook of Ohio, who gives it as “an excellent article on Rhodesia by Milton Friedman, which appeared in the May 3 edition of Newsweek”, Congressional Record, April 29, 1976, p. 11979
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  22. Most colleges and universities have accepted—and lobbied extensively for—Federal funds, and their receipt of Federal funds is the legal justification for HEW jurisdiction over their hiring and other practices. They are hoist on their own petard when they now complain that he who pays the piper is calling the tune.
    Bureaucracy Scorned
    Column, 1975, Newsweek (December 29, 1975); reprinted in full in the Congressional Record, Senate, August 26, 1976, p. 28015, under the heading “[From Newsweek, Dec. 29, 1975]”, introduced by Senator Mark Hatfield. Later collected in Bright Promises, Dismal Performance: An Economist’s Protest (1983)., Congressional Record, August 26, 1976, p. 28015
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  23. Just as banks all around the country were closing, the Fed raised the discount rate; that's the rate they charge for loans to banks. Bank failures consequently increased spectacularly. We might have had an economic downturn in the thirties anyway, but in the absence of the Federal Reserve System—with its enormous power to make a bad situation worse—it wouldn't have been anything like the scale we experienced.
    Interview with Milton Friedman
    Interview, 1973, Playboy
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  24. A liberal is fundamentally fearful of concentrated power. His objective is to preserve the maximum degree of freedom for each individual separately that is compatible with one man's freedom not interfering with other men's freedom. He believes that this objective requires that power be dispersed. He is suspicious of assigning to government any functions that can be performed through the market, both because this substitutes coercion for voluntary co-operation in the area in question and because, by giving government an increased role, it threatens freedom in other areas.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Ch. 3 The Control of Money, p. 39
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  25. Of course, we know very well that the situation is precisely the reverse. The lines date from the creation of a real Federal Energy Office run by a very visible, able and articulate William Simon. Which is the cause and which the effect? Did the lines produce the FEO or the FEO the lines?
    FEO and the Gas Lines
    Column, 1974, Newsweek, March 4, 1974; reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, February 27, 1974, pp. 4559 to 4560, introduced by Representative John H. Rousselot of California, who gives it as the column of “Newsweek columnist, Dr. Milton Friedman, in the March 4, 1974, issue”; reprinted again in Extensions of Remarks, April 30, 1974, p. 12454, by Representative Steven D. Symms, from The Freeman (Foundation for Economic Education), Congressional Record, February 27, 1974, p. 4559
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  26. A lottery would only make the arbitrary element overt. Universal national service would compound the evil—regimenting all youth to camouflage the regimentation of some.
    A Volunteer Army
    Column, 1966, Newsweek (December 19, 1966); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Senate, January 22, 1969, p. 1438, under the heading “From Newsweek magazine, Dec. 19, 1966”. Later collected in An Economist’s Protest (1972)., Congressional Record, January 22, 1969, p. 1438
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  27. As a matter of principle, I am opposed to independence for the Federal Reserve System. Monetary policy should be administered by a governmental agency in the regular administrative hierarchy ultimately responsible to Congress.
    Statement to the House Subcommittee on Domestic Finance
    Testimony, 1968, Compendium on Monetary Policy Guidelines and Federal Reserve Structure, Subcommittee on Domestic Finance, House Committee on Banking and Currency, 90th Congress, 2nd Session (December 1968), p. 204
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  28. The most unresolved problem of the day is precisely the problem that concerned the founders of this nation: how to limit the scope and power of government. Tyranny, restrictions on human freedom, come primarily from governmental institutions that we ourselves set up.
    Interview with Milton Friedman
    Interview, 1992, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, The Region, Interview by David Levy, June 1, 1992
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  29. And once you get something in government, it's very hard to get it out. So I think there is a real danger. I don't think we can regard the war as won by any manner of means. I think it still is true that it takes continued effort to keep a society free.
    Commanding Heights: Milton Friedman interview
    Interview, 2000, PBS, “Where We Stand Today,” interview conducted October 1, 2000
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  30. The organization of economic activity through voluntary exchange presumes that we have provided, through government, for the maintenance of law and order to prevent coercion of one individual by another, the enforcement of contracts voluntarily entered into, the definition of the meaning of property rights, the interpretation and enforcement of such rights, and the provision of a monetary framework.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Ch. 2 The Role of Government in a Free Society, p. 27
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  31. Political freedom means the absence of coercion of a man by his fellow men. The fundamental threat to freedom is power to coerce, be it in the hands of a monarch, a dictator, an oligarchy, or a momentary majority. The preservation of freedom requires the elimination of such concentration of power to the fullest possible extent and the dispersal and distribution of whatever power cannot be eliminated — a system of checks and balances.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Ch. 1 The Relation Between Economic Freedom and Political Freedom, p. 15
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  32. 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 Freedom
    Book, 1962, Introduction, p. 3
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  33. The preservation of freedom is the protective reason for limiting and decentralizing governmental power. But there is also a constructive reason. The great advances of civilization, whether in architecture or painting, in science or literature, in industry or agriculture, have never come from centralized government. … Government can never duplicate the variety and diversity of individual action.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Introduction, pp. 2-3
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  34. The political objections are perhaps more obvious than the economic ones. Is it really tolerable in a democracy to have so much power concentrated in a body free from any kind of direct, effective political control?
    Should There Be an Independent Monetary Authority?
    Journal article, 1962, In Search of a Monetary Constitution, ed. Leland B. Yeager (Harvard University Press, 1962), pp. 219–243; reprinted in the House Banking and Currency Committee’s 1968 Compendium on Monetary Policy Guidelines and Federal Reserve Structure, pp. 205–214, p. 208 of the 1968 House reprint
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  35. I say that there is a reverse invisible hand: People who intend to serve only the public interest are led by an invisible hand to serve private interests which was no part of their intention.
    Why Government Is the Problem
    Journal article, 1993, Hoover Institution Press, Essays in Public Policy no. 39, p. 11
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  36. I have no right to coerce someone else, because I cannot be sure that I am right and he is wrong.
    Say 'No' to Intolerance
    Speech, 1991, Liberty, vol. 4, no. 6 (July 1991), p. 17
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  37. There is enormous inertia—a tyranny of the status quo—in private and especially governmental arrangements. Only a crisis—actual or perceived—produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Preface (1982 edition), p. ix
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  38. Those of us who believe in freedom must believe also in the freedom of individuals to make their own mistakes. If a man knowingly prefers to live for today, to use his resources for current enjoyment, deliberately choosing a penurious old age, by what right do we prevent him from doing so? We may argue with him, seek to persuade him that he is wrong, but are we entitled to use coercion to prevent him from doing what he chooses to do? Is there not always the possibility that he is right and that we are wrong? Humility is the distinguishing virtue of the believer in freedom; arrogance, of the paternalist.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Ch. 11, Social Welfare Measures, p. 187
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  39. In words that are more in Parkinson’s style: in a bureaucratic system, useless work drives out useful work.
    Gammon’s “Black Holes”
    Column, 1977, Newsweek (1977); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, November 30, 1977, p. 38195, introduced by Representative John Ashbrook of Ohio as “Mr. Friedman’s article on Gammon’s theory of bureaucratic displacement as it appeared in Newsweek.” The reprint gives no issue date, Congressional Record, November 30, 1977, p. 38195
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  40. We want the kind of world in which greedy people can do the least harm to their fellow men. That’s the kind of world in which power is widely dispersed and each of us has as many alternatives as possible.
    Interview with Milton Friedman
    Interview, 1973, Playboy
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  41. The comparison is not fanciful. The young who are conscripted for “good” purposes must be given basic training. Who decides what that shall consist of? What ideas shall they be indoctrinated with? What purposes are “good”? Someone has to assign the youngsters to various activities. Someone has to enforce discipline on them. What a power to fall into the wrong hands. What a power for the wrong hands to seek.
    Universal National Service
    Column, 1979, Newsweek (1979); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, May 15, 1979, p. 11349, introduced by Representative Ron Paul of Texas, who says Friedman “recently” made these arguments “in Newsweek.” The reprint gives no issue date and omits part of the opening paragraph, Congressional Record, May 15, 1979, p. 11349
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  42. What country in the world today engages in the most extreme anti-Semitic persecution? The Soviet Union. It’s not an accident, because if you have a society with concentrated power, if you have a collectivist society, it’s going to be in a position to exercise the preferences and prejudices of its rulers. Moreover, it’s going to have an incentive to do so, because it’s going to need a scapegoat and it will choose some group like the Jews or the blacks to be the scapegoat. New York and London, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980
    Interview with Milton Friedman
    Interview, 1973, Playboy
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  43. What is socialism? In its purest form, socialism is government ownership and control of the means of production. Ownership of anything implies the right to the income produced by that thing.
    We Have Socialism, Q.E.D.
    Column, 1989, The New York Times, December 31, 1989, Section 4, p. 11
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