Quotes from Capitalism and Freedom

By Milton Friedman (1962)

• There are thus two sets of values that a liberal will emphasize—the values that are relevant to relations among people, which is the context in which he assigns first priority to freedom; and the values that are relevant to the individual in the exercise of his freedom, which is the realm of individual ethics and philosophy.#
  EthicsCulturePolitics
• Any end that can be attained only by the use of bad means must give way to the more basic end of the use of acceptable means.#
  Ethics
• That majority rule is an expedient rather than itself a basic principle is clearly shown by the fact that our willingness to resort to majority rule, and the size of the majority we require, themselves depend on the seriousness of the issue involved.#
  PoliticsDemocracy
• If one were to seek deliberately to devise a system of recruiting and paying teachers calculated to repel the imaginative and daring and self-confident and to attract the dull and mediocre and uninspiring, he could hardly do better than imitate the system of requiring teaching certificates and enforcing standard salary structures that has developed in the larger city and state-wide systems.#
  EducationPolitics
• The substitution of contract arrangements for status arrangements was the first step toward the freeing of the serfs in the Middle Ages.#
  CultureEconomics
• Any minority that counts on specific majority action to defend its interests is short-sighted in the extreme.#
  DemocracyPolitics
• Humility is the distinguishing virtue of the believer in freedom; arrogance, of the paternalist.#
  EthicsPolitics
• The widespread use of the market reduces the strain on the social fabric by rendering conformity unnecessary with respect to any activities it encompasses.#
  EconomicsCulture