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Was Milton Friedman a Socialist? Yes

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Was Milton Friedman a Socialist? Yes MEST Journal DOI .......................... WAS MILTON FRIEDMAN A SOCIALIST? YES. Walter E. Block Harold E. Wirth Eminent Scholar Chair in Economics and Professor of Economics, College of Business Administration, Loyola University New Orleans, 6363 St. Charles Avenue, Box 15, Miller 321, New Orleans, LA 70118 © MESTE NGO JEL category: B, B59 Summary: Milton Friedman was a socialist, because his publications and speeches meet the criterion for the definition of this word: government ownership or control over significant sectors of the economy particularly means of production, such as money, roads; and/or redistributionist schemes such as his negative income tax. This is a controversial claim. It is backed up by the evidence. Keywords: Milton Friedman, socialist, means of production, income redistribution 1 Introduction careful systematic way. There are several Before we can answer any such question, we reasons. must be clear on what socialism is. Then and only First, categorization is an important tool of then can we ascertain whether, if, and to what scholarly scientific pursuit. It is an exaggeration to extent was Friedman a socialist. But, before we claim that biology (genus, species, family) and do that,1 let us reflect upon why it is important to chemistry (the periodic table) consists of nothing even ask this question, let alone answer it in a but compartmentalization; however, there is surely a germ of truth in so outlandish a claim. In like manner, law distinguishes between legal and The address of the author: illegal,2 philosophy is commonly divided into Walter Block subjects such as ethics, metaphysics, [email protected] epistemology, and also into schools of thought 1 Since many people will object to this question even (profiteering, price gouging), too low a price being posed (predatory price cutting, price warfare) or even the 2 Antitrust law, supported by Friedman (1999), is an same price as everyone else (cartelization, exception to this rule. In that case, a businessman can conspiracy). be found guilty of charging too high a price Published online: 15 January 2013 MESTE | 11 Block W. Was Milton Friedman a socialist? Yes. MEST Journal Vol.1 No.1 pp. 11 - 26 such as utilitarianism, deontology, ordinary one fell swoop defanged. This, alone, would language (analytic), hermeneutics, existentialism, render the present inquiry justified. etc.; sociology partakes of both structuralism and In section 2 of this paper we base our analysis on functionalism; in economics there are the Marxist, the assumption that socialism is defined in terms Austrian and mainstream or neoclassical schools of governmental ownership of the means of of thought; in psychology there are Jungians, production.” Section 3 is given over to assessing Rogerians, Freudians, behavioralists, etc. With all Friedman’s role in terms of the “from each… to this plethora, is the distinction between socialists each” definition of socialism. The role of section 4 and capitalists, alone, to be ignored? Hardly. is to deal with objections to our thesis. We A second reason for the present inquiry is that conclude in section 5. Milton Friedman is known far and wide as a supporter of capitalism, free enterprise, private 2 Socialism: state ownership of capital property rights, etc. Summers (2006) said goods Friedman's great popular contribution was "in So we now return to our initial question: what is convincing people of the importance of allowing socialism?3 The most technical and perhaps the free markets to operate." Here is a similar quote: most accurate definition of this concept is, “(Milton Friedman) advocated minimizing the role Government ownership of all of the means of of government in a free market as a means of production, e.g., capital goods. States Mises creating political and social freedom” (Donahue, (2009): “My own definition of Socialism, as a 2007). Here is another: “Milton Friedman was the policy which aims at constructing a society in twentieth century’s most prominent advocate of which the means of production are socialized, is free markets” (Anon, The concise encyclopedia of in agreement with all that scientists have written economics - Milton Friedman (1912 - 2006), on the subject.” The U.S.S.R., North Korea, 2008). Here is what he said about himself Cuba, China, many countries in Eastern Europe (Friedman M. , 1999) in this regard: “… a believer and Asia before, during and after World War II in the pursuit of self-interest in a competitive would qualify under this definition. Clearly, capitalist system.” According to Doherty (2012), Friedman cannot be a socialist in this sense, Friedman self-describes as a person since large parts of his career were spent “who...preach[es] laissez faire.” Can it be that inveighing against precisely these types of such a description is justified? Or is it the case institutional arrangements. that the very opposite is far nearer to the truth? But, there are socialists, and then there are The very title of the present essay exhibits the socialists. Suppose a nation’s government owns viewpoint on this matter of the present author. not 100% of all capital goods, but 90%, 80%, Third, enquiring minds want to know the truth 70%, etc. It what point does such a country cease about this issue because in all too many cases, being socialist, and begin its move toward a critics of the free enterprise system are likely to mixed economy? The point is that there is a say that even Milton Friedman supports some continuum (Block & Barnett II, Continuums, governmental program or other. You, therefore, in 2008.) in this measurement, as there is in many not agreeing with this scholar, place yourself others.4 States Hoppe (Hoppe, The Economics outside the realm of responsible discourse. If and Ethics of Private Property: Studies in Political Friedman, however, is the socialist I claim he is, Economy and Philosophy. Second Edition., 2006) then this rejoinder is no longer open to the explicit in this regard: “Socialism must be conceptualized enemies of economic freedom; all such as an institutional interference with or aggression accusations against true libertarians would be at against private property and private property 3 Socialism may be broken down into its voluntary and economies of socialist countries such as Cuba, North coercive strands. In the former case, there are the Korea, the USSR, Nazi Germany, etc. We will use the nunnery, convent, kibbutz, commune, collective, word “socialism” in the latter understanding syndicalist, cooperatives, monastery, abbey, priory, throughout this paper. friary, religious community; in the latter, the 4 Is a person tall? Short? It all depends. 12 | MESTE Published online: 15 January 2013 Block W. Was Milton Friedman a socialist? Yes. MEST Journal Vol.1 No.1 pp. 11 - 26 claims…(Capitalism) on the other hand, is a did Friedman advocate government ownership or social system based on the explicit recognition of control of the means of production. private property and of nonaggressive, Let us list the ways. contractual exchanges between private property owners.” In like manner, whether a scholar such First and foremost, this economist supported the as Friedman is a socialist or not, depends upon Federal Reserve System all throughout his where on this spectrum he lies, in terms of what professional life.6 That organization of course percentage of capital goods he wants the does not own the money stock, but it certainly government to own. controls it.7 Friedman was an inveterate hater of the gold standard, denigrating its advocates as However, outright explicit ownership is only a first “gold bugs.” In the view of Rothbard (Rothbard, approximation. Ludwig Wittgenstein was walking Milton Friedman Unraveled, 1971 [2002]): “… down the street with Norman Malcolm. The first Milton Friedman is a radical advocate of cutting philosopher said to the second, I’ll give you these all current ties, however weak, with gold, and trees, provided you do nothing to them, nor going onto a total and absolute fiat dollar prevent the previous owner from doing anything standard, with all control vested in the Federal he pleases with them.5 The point is, there is Reserve System.” Whenever people were free to ownership, and then there is ownership. Or, to put choose,8 they chose gold as their money, and this in other words, control is what ownership is sometimes silver. The “gold standard” is, then, all about. The Nazi socialist government was not properly characterized as free market money. extreme in its explicit ownership of the means of Friedman is clearly on the socialist side of this production. But that version of socialism, that is, very important means of production. fascism, was earmarked by implicit state ownership, or control, of capital goods. The Friedman was a road socialist. He favored9 pertinent question then becomes, To what extent government ownership and control over the nation’s highways and streets (Seagraves, 2008) 5 Here is the exact quote (Malcolm, 2001, p. 29): "On much power and so much discretion to a few men, [so] one walk he 'gave' to me each tree that we passed, that mistakes -- excusable or not -- can have such far with the reservation that I was not to cut it down or reaching effects, is a bad system. It is a bad system to do anything to it, or prevent the previous owners believers in freedom just because it gives a few men from doing anything to it: with these reservations it such power without any effective check by the body was henceforth mine." I owe this cite to David politic -- this is the key political argument against an Gordon. independent central bank. .To paraphrase 6 It cannot be denied that he was disappointed with Clemenceau: money is much too serious a matter to the fact that the Fed did not follow anything like his be left to the Central Bankers.” (Friedman M.
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