The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the problem.

The greatest advances of civilization, whether in architecture or painting, in science and literature, in industry or agriculture, have never come from centralized government.

Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program.

We have a system that increasingly taxes work and subsidizes nonwork.

Inflation is taxation without legislation.

The Great Depression, like most other periods of severe unemployment, was produced by government mismanagement rather than by any inherent instability of the private economy.

The world runs on individuals pursuing their self interests. The great achievements of civilization have not come from government bureaus. Einstein didn't construct his theory under order from a, from a bureaucrat. Henry Ford didn't revolutionize the automobile industry that way.

There's no such thing as a free lunch.

The only relevant test of the validity of a hypothesis is comparison of prediction with experience.

Universities exist to transmit knowledge and understanding of ideas and values to students not to provide entertainment for spectators or employment for athletes.

Only government can take perfectly good paper, cover it with perfectly good ink and make the combination worthless.

Concentrated power is not rendered harmless by the good intentions of those who create it.

So that the record of history is absolutely crystal clear. That there is no alternative way, so far discovered, of improving the lot of the ordinary people that can hold a candle to the productive activities that are unleashed by a free enterprise system.

I am favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for any reason, whenever it's possible.

Indeed, a major source of objection to a free economy is precisely that it... gives people what they want instead of what a particular group thinks they ought to want. Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself.

Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself.

When government - in pursuit of good intentions - tries to rearrange the economy, legislate morality, or help special interests, the cost come in inefficiency, lack of motivation, and loss of freedom. Government should be a referee, not an active player.

Every friend of freedom must be as revolted as I am by the prospect of turning the United States into an armed camp, by the vision of jails filled with casual drug users and of an army of enforcers empowered to invade the liberty of citizens on slight evidence.

Governments never learn. Only people learn.

If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand.

If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand.

The only way that has ever been discovered to have a lot of people cooperate together voluntarily is through the free market. And that's why it's so essential to preserving individual freedom.

Government has three primary functions. It should provide for military defense of the nation. It should enforce contracts between individuals. It should protect citizens from crimes against themselves or their property.

Many people want the government to protect the consumer. A much more urgent problem is to protect the consumer from the government.

I think that the Internet is going to be one of the major forces for reducing the role of government. The one thing that's missing, but that will soon be developed, is a reliable e-cash - a method whereby on the Internet you can transfer funds from A to B without A knowing B or B knowing A.