Best of - Milton Friedman: Champion of Capitalism

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Academy of Achievement

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4.6 • 943 Ratings

🗓️ 17 October 2022

⏱️ 57 minutes

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Summary

As Americans struggle to pay their bills in the face of inflation, policymakers and economists are debating the best way to control rising prices. Central to that debate are ideas first put forward by Milton Friedman, winner of the 1976 Nobel Prize for economics, and a leading theorist of inflation. Friedman was an outspoken proponent of the free market and small government, and one of the most influential economists of all time. His ideas on monetary policy, taxation, privatization and deregulation have had enormous impact on government policies in the U.S. (and around the world) for over 50 years, including the Federal Reserve’s response to the global financial crisis. In this re-broadcast of our episode (which originally posted in 2020), Friedman talks about growing up in a home with poorly-educated, immigrant parents, and about how he fell in love with math. He explains how the Depression and the New Deal opened his eyes to the importance of economics. And he lays out his analysis of market forces and the role of government. Thirty years after this interview was recorded, his ideas are as provocative as ever. (c ) American Academy of Achievement 2020-2022

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, it's Alice. While Americans struggle with inflation in their daily lives, whether at the grocery
0:07.5	store or in their rent checks, policy makers are debating how best to control rising prices.
0:15.0	So it seemed like just the right time to rebroadcast our episode on Milton Friedman,
0:20.0	a Nobel Prize-winning economist, and one of the leading theorists of inflation.
0:27.0	Friedman's analysis of the causes of inflation was stark.
0:31.0	It was a result in his view of one thing and one thing only, excessive government
0:37.2	spending.
0:38.2	Inflation is made in Washington because only Washington can create money. And any other attribution to other groups of inflation is wrong.
0:49.2	Consumers don't produce it. Producers don't produce it.
0:56.0	The trade unions don't produce it.
0:59.0	Foreign sheaks don't produce it.
1:01.0	Oil imports don't produce it. what produces it, is too much government spending and too much
1:07.8	government creation of money and nothing else. But Friedman did not lay the blame for excessive government spending on lawmakers of either political party.
1:17.0	He placed the blame squarely on voters.
1:21.0	Before you clap, let me point out that the reason why we have too much printed spending
1:27.0	and too much printing and money is because you people want it.
1:30.0	You and I, we're citizens, we run this country.
1:33.6	If Congress has been voting higher and higher spending,
1:36.3	why?
1:37.8	Because it has been politically profitable for them to do it.
1:41.0	If they have been voting higher spending and not voting the higher taxes to pay for it, why?
1:46.0	Because it's been politically profitable to do it.
	...

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