Ed. note: Milton Friedman was born on this day 114 years ago. MasterResource celebrates his ideas and legacy each July 31st. This post presents an example that countless others with open minds can emulate in a time of political polarization.

“Instead of blaming bad leaders, we should first reflect on what we have done—or failed to fulfill our CITIZENSHIP—that allowed these people to gain power. Starting with reviewing Dr. Friedman’s concepts of ‘free enterprise’, could be a good first step of a thousand miles to go.” (Ruby Kamm, below)

On social media several years ago, Ruby Kamm described her ascent from Marxist indoctrination to understanding free-market capitalism. Coming to see the distinction between freedom and opportunity and crony political capitalism was important. Milton Friedman stands as the most influential economist and public advocate of economic freedom in the second half of the 20th century.…

“Few U.S. industries sing the praises of free enterprise more loudly than the oil industry. Yet few industries rely so heavily on special governmental favors.” (Milton Friedman, 1967)

In honor of his 107th birthday, MasterResource reprints a 1967 essay by Milton Friedman, “Oil and the Middle East,” which nicely summarized the political power and cronyism of the domestic oil industry at the time. [1] Far from just historical, the animus created by pro-crony policies over a half century came home to roost in the 1970s when Northeast politicians and others imposed price controls and new taxes on the industry. That animus exists today under the hubris of climate policy.

Background

From the 1920s through the early 1970s, the political power of the domestic oil industry (primarily independent oil producers versus the integrated majors) succeeded in having the major oil states (excepting California) artificially restrict (‘prorate’) production to ‘market demand.’…

“Milton Friedman’s timeless energy insights should be appreciated for all time.”

Born on this day 106 years ago, free-market economist Milton Friedman (1912–2006) was one of a kind. Even the dyspeptic Paul Krugman called his rival “the economist’s economist…a very great man indeed—a man of intellectual courage who was one of the most important economic thinkers of all time and possibly the most brilliant communicator of economic ideas to the general public that ever lived.” The Economist (November 23, 2006) called him “the most influential economist of the second half of the twentieth century… and possibly all of it.”

Milton Friedman’s major professional mark was in monetary economics. But as a public intellectual, writing popular books and a biweekly Newsweek column, he became conversant in different fields, including energy.

Friedman understood how, for much of US history, major energy regulation was sponsored by some segment of the industry.…

“I think [Julian Simon] probably should have been considered for a Nobel Prize.  He took a very independent position with little backing, dug deep and provided very good evidence for his predictions and expectations.”

“I do not believe there is a natural resource economics.  I believe there is good economics and bad economics.”

• Milton Friedman (below)

Editor note: Milton Friedman would be 105 this day. Born July 31, 1912, in New York City, he died on November 16, 2006, in San Francisco, age 94.

Reprinted below is an exchange between Robert Bradley Jr. and the Milton Friedman when the Nobel Laureate was 91 years old–a testament to the patience, scholarship, and longevity of one of the greatest social thinkers of modern time.