What Is the Economic Philosophy of the New President Chosen by the People, Yoon Suk Yeol?: Freedom to Choose

The Freedom to Choose: A Path to Prosperity

The first liberal work I ever encountered was Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose. I first came across it when I was in college. It was a time when saying “No” felt awkward when everyone else was saying “Yes.” Perhaps because I read it in an era filled with activist literature, it felt strikingly different. I clearly sensed that it was unlike other books. I also thought it contained a message that corresponded well to reality.

The contents of the book also aligned closely with my own worldview. Although things are not entirely different even now, the atmosphere on university campuses at the time was dominated by a particularly critical and negative view of capitalism and liberalism. Constructive criticism can produce positive results, but negative thinking easily slips into pessimism. Yet the liberal ideas I encountered through Free to Choose were positive and future-oriented. That came as a fresh shock. This book says, in effect, that “there is a system in the wider world that responsibly manages reality.” And it presented that system in a rational and sophisticated manner. Though I only sensed it vaguely at the time, the book had the power not only to provide a logic that resonated with me personally, but also to offer, at the national level, a convincing methodology for securing both economic freedom and political freedom.

This book realistically illuminated the foundations of liberal thought and even presented policy alternatives. In the end, liberalism was newly spotlighted in the 1980s and was translated into concrete policy through real-world politics. Prime Minister Thatcher in the United Kingdom and President Reagan in the United States introduced liberal policies such as privatization and tax cuts. As a result, individual freedom expanded and the private economy regained its vitality.

The Emergence of Free to Choose

Just as every era has its symbolic figures, there are also books that vividly express the spirit of their age. Free to Choose may be called a book that helped determine a new course in the history of the late 20th century. It is also a symbolic work because it successfully exposed how illusory anti-capitalist policies were when governments regulated people’s private lives.

It is not easy to live as a liberal. Liberals are easily misunderstood as selfish. Capitalism and liberalism are often criticized as cold and self-centered. But freedom can produce positive results because it presupposes responsibility. By contrast, prioritizing equality while failing to guarantee individual freedom leads to rigid, oppressive, and negative outcomes.

In that sense, Free to Choose is a book with which one can deeply sympathize. Through this book, Milton Friedman made clear to the public of his day that it was wrong to blindly believe in interventionism—the idea that government stands at the center of solving every problem. His logic was realistic and powerfully persuasive. The book had a major impact because it boldly and logically pointed out the errors of Keynesian economics, which at the time was regarded by nearly everyone as correct.

Moreover, it does not stop at criticism alone. It goes further, explaining why governments that prioritize control produce bad results, and how wrong it is to restrict consumer choice. In doing so, it provided an opportunity for economics to reestablish its theoretical framework around the market economy. His compelling logic was effectively conveyed to the public, and in the end the course of economic history was able to turn toward freedom and progress. For these achievements, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1976.

A great thinker can change the course of an era. One person can alter the rise and fall of a nation, or even reshape the global order. Through Free to Choose, Milton Friedman laid the groundwork for the revival of the capitalist world order.

Because of government interventionism that had continued since the 1930s, the global economy fell into severe inflation and tremendous stagnation in the 1970s. The thinker who saved the world economy from this crisis was Milton Friedman, and his representative work was Free to Choose.

Friedman assessed the United States from 1780 to 1929 as a period in which liberalism, oriented toward limited government, endured for a long time and produced a history of prosperous success. That success, he argued, was the result of the harmonious combination of two pillars: individual freedom and economic freedom.

Economic freedom was explained in terms of the protection of property rights, freedom of trade, and small government. Friedman’s discussion later developed into the concrete and quantitative form of the “Index of Economic Freedom,” and countries around the world competed to enhance economic freedom and achieved development as a result.

By contrast, the ideas of Karl Marx, who denied the economic freedom of capitalism and advocated communism, ultimately drove countless people into oppression and poverty. Every country that experimented with communism collapsed economically, and in the end the experiment came to a close with the fall of the Soviet Union.

Even though communist states thus met defeat, another powerful wave of government interventionism arose in advanced countries—whose economic levels had already been relatively high in the 1930s—once again suppressing individual freedom and forcing people into lives dependent on government. The socialist wave that emerged within the capitalist camp, especially in the United States and Europe, was based mainly on expanding the role of government. The figure who symbolically represented this was John Maynard Keynes, who opened the age of government interventionism.

If Marx degraded developing countries into totalitarian communist states, Keynes caused advanced countries to be contaminated by socialism. He ushered in an era in which government intervened in the market in place of individual freedom and choice. From the 1930s to the 1970s, it was an age of politics of the government, by the government, and for the government. Big government was the dominant force, and all thinking and all solutions were thought possible through government.

But in the end, government interventionism plunged the world economy into crisis, and amid this economic drought, Milton Friedman’s arrival was like timely rain. He succeeded in bringing the socialist political trend to an end, restoring the purity of capitalism, and breathing new vitality into human life.

Free to Choose argues that the role of government should be minimized to protecting individuals’ lives, property, and liberty, and that the power of government should be dispersed as much as possible. Friedman flatly declared that “a truly free man will ask neither what his country can do for him nor what he can do for his country,” and said that a free person “must ask rather how he and his fellow citizens can use government as an instrument to preserve their freedom, to discharge their responsibilities, and to keep from creating a Frankenstein that will destroy the very freedom we establish it to protect.”

The Freedom to Choose Leads to Success

As the age of socialist distribution systems and big government, which suppressed economic freedom, came to an end, capitalist countries increasingly gained the upper hand economically. Communist states, which eventually fell behind in the competition of systems, disappeared one by one into history. Sound ideas succeeded in persuading the public, guided political and economic leaders in the right direction, and ultimately contributed to the progress of humanity.

Former U.S. President Reagan held firm convictions. He clearly recognized the evil of communism and had the practical judgment to see that it could not be resolved through compromise and tolerance. Externally, he applied real and concrete pressure on the communist bloc, breaking the vicious cycle. How were politicians like Reagan able to succeed in reforms that changed the course of their times? From where did they derive the leadership that enabled them to transform an era?

Reagan’s thought can be traced to Hayek and Friedman. Hayek, who laid the theoretical foundation of liberal philosophy, said, “It is ideas that change the world.” As he said, great ideas can make the world brighter and more prosperous. Hayek and Friedman were thinkers who pointed out that respecting individual freedom and choice and minimizing government intervention make a more advanced life possible. Influenced by these two men, Reagan succeeded in changing the world as a practical politician.

One noteworthy point in Free to Choose is that Friedman did not claim that “freedom is absolute.” He also acknowledged that freedom can be subject to constraints. What he opposed was “excessive restriction” on freedom. He said:

“Freedom cannot be absolute. We live in an interdependent society. Some limitations on our freedom are necessary to avoid other still worse restrictions. However, we have gone far beyond that point. Today our urgent need is not to impose additional restraints on freedom, but to eliminate those that already exist.”

Whether freedom or equality should be given priority has long been one of humanity’s enduring questions. Behind the conflicts between capitalism and socialism, and between liberalism and government interventionism, lies this very issue. Friedman’s following words offer much for us to reflect on:

“A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both.”

Human beings have the right to pursue what they want. That is precisely the freedom to choose. We have the right to choose in politics, religion, society, and across life as a whole. A society in which government makes those choices on our behalf will find it difficult to prosper. When the government, under the banner of some “noble” goal, takes away the people’s right to choose, that power is highly likely to be exploited by interest groups or used merely to expand the government’s own power.

We Must Broaden the Range of Choice

Friedman’s Free to Choose also offers meaningful implications for the Republic of Korea. Every individual citizen possesses the freedom to choose, and through sound choices can write a history of success. The path of progress lies in breaking away from a paternalistic culture that seeks to solve problems by depending on government, and instead respecting individual freedom and expanding economic freedom. Friedman said:

“Fortunately, we are still free as a people to choose whether we shall continue down the road we have been traveling, to bigger and bigger government, or whether we shall set a different course.”

How grateful we should be that, as Friedman said, the “freedom to choose” is still given to us. We have the right to enjoy the freedom to choose now, without clinging to the past. Korean society, too, must move toward a new era in which the range of individual choice is broadened. It is time to reduce and reform arbitrary government regulation. That path will be the solution that leads to economic prosperity.

The more difficult the economy becomes, the more faithfully we must return to basics. Humanity has enriched its life through the market economy. We, too, must once again turn our attention to minimizing government intervention, removing control and oppression, and expanding individual freedom.

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Original title: 국민이 선택한 새로운 대통령 윤석열의 경제철학은?: <선택할 자유>

Author: Sung-no Choi

Date: 2022-03-10

Source: https://www.cfe.org/bbs/bbsDetail.php?cid=notice&pn=15&idx=24574