Friedman was effective in part because he was obviously a person of
goodwill. I never had the feeling with him, as with many writers in the
free-market line, that he was promoting cynical selfishness, or pushing
the interests of business. He genuinely believed that economics was
about making people’s lives better and that disagreements among
economists were about means rather than ends and could ultimately be
resolved by careful attention to the evidence.
The various reactions to Friedman’s death have I’m afraid simply confirmed me in some of my prejudices. There are decent people with whom I still manage to disagree, as here, and there are others not so decent as here.
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