"A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both."
— Milton Friedman
A Society That Puts Equality Before
A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both.
About this quote
This passage comes from Free to Choose (1980), the book and accompanying PBS television series that Friedman co-authored with his wife Rose Friedman. The argument draws on Friedman's analysis in Capitalism and Freedom (1962): that political equality and economic freedom are complementary, and that redistributionist policies pursued in the name of equality typically require coercive state power that ultimately undermines both equality and freedom.
Source
Free to Choose, 1980
