Why does "Reality Has a Liberal Bias" falsely attribute a famous quote to economist Milton Friedman?
In another question, "Reality Has" attributes the famous quote "we are all Keynesians now" to brilliant economist Milton Friedman, when in fact it was Richard Nixon who said it. Why do devout leftists like "Reality Has" lie in public forums like Yahoo Answers?
2010-10-09T08:27:06Z
He's the first answer in this question, so if you don't see his answer after you click on the link he cowardly deleted it or if it says something other than attributing the quote to Friedman he changed it. Let's see what the coward does.
Yes, it's as true now as it was then. The trouble is that socialists can always outbid free market proponents in the auction for desirable outcomes. Of course, they can't deliver, but the pitch is always seductive, especially to the young and the poor. Some people will always be more attracted to a system that promises universal utopia, than to a system which acknowledges the inevitability of winners and losers. And in selecting the system which promises what cannot be achieved, they claim moral superiority for having loftier aspirations.
The phrase was first attributed to Milton Friedman in the December 31, 1965 edition of Time magazine.In the February 4, 1966 edition, Friedman wrote a letter clarifying that his original statement had been "In one sense, we are all Keynesians now; in another, nobody is any longer a Keynesian."
In 1971, after taking the United States off the gold standard,Nixon was quoted as saying "I am now a Keynesian in economics", which became popularly associated with Friedman's phrase.
I bet you will never admit he/or she was right and you were wrong.
"The new economics is based on Keynes. The fiscal revolution stems from him." Adds the University of Chicago's Milton Friedman, the nation's leading conservative economist, who was Presidential Candidate Barry Goldwater's adviser on economics: "We are all Keynesians now."