Informed Speculation

From today’s Wall Street Journal:

In awarding its Nobel in 1976, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences cited his “achievements in the fields of consumption analysis, monetary history and theory, and for his demonstration of the complexity of stabilization policy.” The citation covers a huge swath of economic thinking, and suggests both the range and the consistency of Professor Friedman’s thought. In layman’s terms, the Swedish Academy credited him with nothing less than shredding the Keynesian consensus.  

First, he had shown that men are no fools. People spend money in accordance with their income expectations over the long-term, not in response to one-time “stimuli” from the government. This is known as the “permanent income” hypothesis, and it called into question Keynesian notions of how short-term stimulus affects the economy. In addition to his monetary insights, Mr. Friedman questioned the degree to which fiscal policy could be used to “fine-tune” the economy by adjusting spending, tax or monetary policy. Today we take for granted that all of these operate with a lag, but it was Milton Friedman who first highlighted the problem.

For all of his academic accomplishments, Professor Friedman’s role as a popularizer of free-market principles was arguably more important. He wrote a column in Newsweek for 18 years starting in 1966, preaching the importance of economic freedom to a generation that had never heard such things in school. His 1980 book, “Free to Choose,” was a best seller, and the videos that accompanied it were smuggled behind the Iron Curtain like seeds of revolution.

He was among the first to point to Hong Kong as a model of free-market success, a lesson that even today is remaking Communist China. And he first suggested educational vouchers to rescue failing public schools as long ago as 1955; in recent years, he established a foundation to support this idea that continues to advance despite ferocious opposition from unions and other entrenched interests.

Pity that we’re still having to fight that voucher battle…nevertheless, quite a legacy for one man…