Economy

Big government is not the solution to our social problems, it is the
primary cause of those problems. Not only does it threaten our economic
and political freedom,1 big government has slowed economic growth and
depressed productivity,2 stimulated a rise in criminality and violence,3
weakened the family,4 generated racial unrest,5 lowered the quality of our
schools,6 and increased poverty.7 So runs the litany of evils that,
according to Milton Friedman, are the manifest products of big
government.
In their preface to Free to Choose, the Friedmans write,
Our principles offer no hard and fast line how far it is appropriate to use
government to accomplish jointly what it is difficult or impossible for us to
accomplish separately through strictly voluntary exchange. In any particular
case of proposed intervention, we must make up a balance sheet, listing
separately the advantages and disadvantages. Our principles tell us what items
to put on the one side and what items on the other and they give us some
basis for attaching importance to the different items.8
The above quotation suggests that what will follow in Free to Choose
is a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of government
programs and a careful assessment of their costs and benefits. Instead,
what we find there, as well as in Friedman's numerous popular essays, is
a highly dogmatic polemic against all social programs. Government
efforts to achieve greater equality in the distribution of income; social
security for the aged; and programs aimed at protecting consumers, the
environment, and workers on the job are uniformly attacked. Friedman's [continues]

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