Milton Friedman (born July 31, 1912) is a U.S. economist, known primarily for his work on macroeconomics and for his advocacy of laissez-faire capitalism. In 1976 he was awarded the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel "for his achievements in the fields of consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and for his demonstration of the complexity of stabilization policy." His book Free to Choose, coauthored with his wife Rose, was made into a ten-part television series that aired on PBS in early 1980.

Contents

1 Biography 2 Works 2.1 Notable academic publications 2.2 Quotes 3 See also 3.1 Lists 4 External links

Biography

Born in New York City to a working-class family of Jewish Hungarian immigrants from Beregszász (Berehove, today Ukraine), Friedman was educated at Rutgers University (B.A., 1932) and at the University of Chicago (M.A., 1933). After working for the federal government and for Columbia University, he received a Ph.D. from that institution in 1946. He then served as Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago from 1946 to 1976, where he contributed significantly to the intellectual tradition of the so-called Chicago school of economics. Since 1977, Friedman has been affiliated with the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

Friedman can be classified as a monetarist and he is widely regarded as the leading proponent of that economic school of thought. He maintains that there is a close and stable link between inflation and the money supply, rejects the use of fiscal policy as a tool of demand management and holds that the government's role in the management of the economy should be severely restricted. Friedman wrote a veritable tome on the subject of the Great Depression which he called the Great Contraction, attributing it to the failure of The Federal Reserve. He argued for the cessation of intervention in exchange markets, thereby spawning an enormous literature on the subject, as well as the practice of freely floating exchange rates.

He has also supported various libertarian policies such as decriminalization of drugs and prostitution. In addition, he headed the Reagan committee that researched the possibility of a move towards a paid/volunteer armed force, and played a role in the abolition of the draft that took place in the 1970s in the U.S.

Friedman visited Chile in 1975 during the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Invited by a private foundation, he gave a series of lectures on economics. Several professors from the University of Chicago became advisors to the Chilean government and several Ph.D. graduates from the same university -- known as "the Chicago boys" -- served in Chilean ministries. Despite having no direct personal contact with Pinochet's government, Friedman was accused of supporting a regime whose policies included torture and the killing of political opponents. A number of protesters demonstrated against Friedman during the 1976 Nobel Prize ceremony. (See: Miracle of Chile)

Critics have remarked that Chile's dictatorship used its power to implement free-market policies, thus contradicting the relationship that Friedman claims exists between open markets and political freedom. Friedman defends his role in Chile on the grounds that the move towards open market policies by the dictatorship was laudable, and that, in his view, it contributed to the softening of Pinochet's rule and to its eventual replacement by a democratic government in 1990. He also stresses that the lectures he gave in Chile in 1975 were the same lectures he later gave without incident in China and other Socialist states.

He however also visited Apartheid South Africa and Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in March - April of 1976, two months before the Soweto uprising which was viciously suppressed by the National Party government. On 2nd May 1976 he wrote an article for the Sunday Times in South Africa in which he supported the racist minority government of Ian Smith. Whilst in South Africa he met the State President, Dr N. Diederichs and many of Apartheid's cabinet ministers. Friedman missed the opportunity to criticise the disenfranchisement of the majority of the people of South Africa and Zimbabwe and suggest a simple non-racist one person one vote system enjoyed by the citizens of the West.

Friedman served as a member of U.S. President Ronald Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board in 1981. In 1988 he received both the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the National Medal of Science.

In recent years Friedman has devoted much of his effort to promoting school vouchers that can be used to pay for tuition at both private and public schools, saying, "What is needed in America is a voucher of substantial size available to all students, and free of excessive regulations."

Milton Friedman's son, David Friedman, has carried on his tradition of arguing in favor of free markets.

Works

• Capitalism and Freedom ISBN 0226264017
• Free to Choose: A Personal Statement ISBN 0156334607
• Monetary History of the United States, 1867-1960 (with Anna Schwartz) ISBN 0691003548
• Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History ISBN 0151620423
• Price Theory ISBN 3110109875
• Economic Freedom, Human Freedom, Political Freedom ISBN 188396900X
• Two Lucky People: Memoirs (with Rose Friedman) ISBN 0226264149
• Why Government Is the Problem ISBN 0817954422
• Milton Friedman in South Africa ISBN 0799202053

Notable academic publications

• The Methodology of Positive Economics (http://www.lib.pku.edu.cn/webcourse/new_econ/readings/Methodology.pdf)

Quotes

• "I am in favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for any reason, whenever it's possible."
• "A major source of objection to a free economy is precisely that it [...] gives people what they want instead of what a particular group thinks they ought to want. Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself."
• "Inflation is the one form of taxation that can be imposed without legislation."
• "The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the problem."
• "There's no such thing as a free lunch."
• "We have a system that increasingly taxes work and subsidizes nonwork."

See also

• Chicago Boys
• Chicago school
• Mont Pelerin Society
• Neoliberalism

Lists

• List of economists
• List of economics consultancies and think tanks
• Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel

External links

• Home page of Milton Friedman (http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/bios/friedman.html)
• The Friedman Foundation (http://www.friedmanfoundation.org/)
• About Milton Friedman (http://www.nobel-winners.com/Economics/milton_friedman.html)
• PBS interview, profile and video (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/commandingheights/hi/people/pe_name.html)
• 1976 Prize in Economics, from the official Nobel Prize website (http://nobelprize.org/economics/laureates/1976/index.html)
• His view of the Chilean government (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/commandingheights/shared/minitext/int_miltonfriedman.html#10)
• Gary Becker on Friedman's influence in South America (http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/publications/digest/974/bckr3.html)
• Milton Friedman (http://www.adamsmith.org/friedman/) on the Adam Smith Institute (http://www.adamsmith.org/) website

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