552 Quotes by Milton Friedman

Adam Smith’s key insight was that both parties to an exchange can benefit and that, so long as cooperation is strictly voluntary, no exchange can take place unless both parties do benefit.

To really understand something you’ve got to reduce it to its principles.

The government doesn’t have any money. The only power it has is to take from some and give to others.

If freedom were not so economically efficient it certainly wouldn’t stand a chance.

Americans know very little about social statistics, but I am not sure that it’s important that Americans know about social statistics.

Complete free trade is not politically feasible. Why? Because it’s only in the general interest and in no one’s special interest.

The great virtue of a free market is that it enables people who hate each other, or who are from vastly different religious or ethnic backgrounds, to cooperate economically. Government intervention can’t do that.

There is only one social responsibility of business.

Every economist knows that minimum wages either do nothing or cause inflation and unemployment. That’s not a statement, it’s a definition.