Opinion: Milton Friedman, R.I.P.

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The Nobel Prize-winning economist is dead at the age of 94. There is too much to say of this great and extremely short American, whose ideas on the role of currency in the economy, consumer choice, and a range of other issues have become such conventional wisdom that it’s hard to remember they were ever controversial. For a good start, read Brian Doherty’s tribute: ‘We can thank him, in large part, for happy events from the elimination of the draft to the conquest of inflation...his impact was staggering, and there could never be enough words said in praise of him.’ Read the whole thing for a libertarian compendium of Friedmania.

First out of the gate in the speaking-ill-of-the-dead department is Richard Adams, although his judgment that Friedman was mostly a failure is really about how few of his ideas ended up getting adopted: We’re still fighting the war on drugs, prostitution is still illegal, Nixon wrecked the American economy with wage and price controls, and middle class Americans in cities still can’t get their kids into decent schools. These are our failures, not Friedman’s. Adams does, however, point to one innovation that is no doubt costing Friedman some time in Purgatory right now: He invented automatic payroll tax withholding, that World War II emergency measure that is strangely still with us.

Other obits: From New York, where he was born (Brooklyn), from Chicago, where he started the ‘Chicago school,’ and from the Bay Area, where he died.