[2025-04-08] Milton Friedman's warning to DOGE

Reason TV

Tuesday, April 8, 2025

Milton Friedman's warning to DOGE

The Nobel Prize-winning economist says the Iron Triangle of Politics must be defeated to cut down the government for good.

https://reason.com/video/2025/04/08/milton-friedmans-warning-to-doge/

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"Wise words," wrote Elon Musk about this 1999 viral clip described as "Milton Friedman casually giving the blueprint for DOGE [the Department of Government Efficiency]" as he ticks off a list of federal government agencies he'd be comfortable eliminating.

Musk is right. Friedman, a Nobel Prize–winning libertarian economist, did offer a solid blueprint for creating a smaller, less intrusive government. At the peak of his fame, he seemed poised to influence an American president to finally slash the federal bureaucracy.

But those efforts ended in disappointment because they were blocked by what Friedman called the Iron Triangle of Politics.

Slashing government waste and making the federal bureaucracy more accountable are incredibly important. But President Donald Trump and Musk are hitting the same wall President Ronald Reagan did more than four decades ago.

Now more than ever, it's time to pay attention to Milton Friedman's advice for how to defeat the tyranny of the status quo.

DOGE's mission to rein in our catastrophic debt and unrestrained federal government is one of the most important political battles of our time. But it's a mission that will need more than a single executive agency to ultimately succeed: It needs a mass political movement.

Photo credits: Everett Collection/Newscom, Bonnie Cash - Pool via CNP/CNP / Polaris/Newscom, Graeme Sloan/Sipa USA/Newscom, Mattie Neretin - CNP/Newscom, CNP/AdMedia/SIPA/Newscom, Mattie Neretin - CNP/Sipa USA/Newscom, CNP/AdMedia/SIPA/Newscom, Yuri Gripas - Pool via CNP/ZUMAPRESS/Newscom, © Tobias Arhelger | Dreamstime.com, Sipa USA/Newscom, Sipa USA/Newscom, Everett Collection/Newscom, Gage Skidmore (CC BY-SA 2.0), rawpixel.com / Library of Congress, © Joe Sohm | Dreamstime.com, Joe Tabb, The U.S. National Archives, Michael Evans/ZUMAPRESS/Newscom

Video Producer: Zach Weissmueller

Video Editor: John Osterhoudt

Graphics: Lex Villena

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1K_5YOcRrQ

#miltonfriedman, #ronaldregan, #conservatives, #libertarians, #politics, #downsize, #government, #elonmusk, #trump, #mistakes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1K_5YOcRrQ

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