The ingrained idea that, because there is no king and they despise titles, the Americans are a free people is pathetically untrue...There is a perpetual interference with personal liberty over there that would not be tolerated in England for a week.

ASQUITH, MARGOT, My Impressions of America, Chapter 17, 1922

The present-day delusion is an attempt to enrich everyone at the expense of everyone else; to make plunder universal under the pretense of organizing it.

BASTIAT, FREDERIC, The Law

You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the great struggle for independence.

BEARD, CHARLES AUSTIN (attributed)

By our practice, we say that we believe in free enterprise--except . . . Except for public utilities. Except for the railroads. Except for mail delivery. Except for medical services. Except for housing, financing, and real estate transactions. Except for large corporations. Except for education. Except for interest rates. Except for farmers. Except for small business. Except for industrial workers. In short, a case could be made that Americans believe in free enterprise except in whatever activities they happen to be considering.

CARSON, CLARENCE B., Free Enterprise: The Key to Prosperity

On both sides of the Atlantic, it is only a little overstated to say that we preach individualism and competitive capitalism, and practice socialism.

FRIEDMAN, MILTON, Introduction to Fiftieth Anniversary Edition of The Road to Serfdom by F.A. HAYEK

The dispute about socialism has thus become largely a dispute about means and not about ends.

HAYEK, F.A., The Road to Serfdom, Chapter 3

We have progressively abandoned that freedom in economic affairs without which personal and political freedom has never existed in the past.

HAYEK, F.A., The Road to Serfdom, Chapter 1

Why hasn't democracy in Latin America produced change? The answer can be found in public-choice theory -- a school of economics made famous by Nobel Prize winner James Buchanan. Public choice views politics as a market, where the highest bidders have the power to "purchase" what they want. Deregulation may be best for the majority, but politicians don't have an incentive to do it when their most powerful, best-organized constituents -- the ones who put them in office -- prefer the status quo. That includes not only labor unions but rich, established oligarchs and government bureaucrats. Most Latin countries don't have large enough middle classes to counter these oppressive forces, thanks to the twin curses of overregulation and weak property rights.

O'GRADY, MARY ANASTASIA, Why Latin Nations Are Poor, Wall Street Journal, November 25, 2005

Latin America is stubbornly stuck in a statist time warp…In the category of the World Bank report that deals with "hiring and firing," Mexico ranks 125th out of the 155 countries surveyed, not least because it costs a firm almost 75 weeks of wages to fire a worker…A medium-sized business in Peru can expect a tax burden reaching almost 51% of gross profits…Argentina, still saddled with Peronist labor laws, has an even less flexible labor market than Peru, at 132nd in "hiring and firing." Moreover, a medium-sized company must theoretically pay almost 98% of its gross profit to the tax man…Colombia -- at 66th -- has dreadful ratings in "hiring and firing" (130th) and in "paying taxes," where a medium-sized business has a total payable tax of 75% of gross profits. Venezuela doesn't enforce contracts (129th), doesn't protect investors (142nd) and makes paying taxes a bureaucratic nightmare (145^th).

O'GRADY, MARY ANASTASIA, Why Latin Nations Are Poor, Wall Street Journal, November 25, 2005

Politically, the goal of today’s dominant trend is statism. Philosophically, the goal is the obliteration of reason; psychologically, it is the erosion of ambition.

RAND, AYN, Tax Credits for Education

Private property and free enterprise are mere skeletons of their past.

WILLIAMS, WALTER, Speech at Campbell University, September 1999