Chapter 10, The Distribution of Income Summary and Analysis

The greatest move towards collectivism in the West has been a belief in income equality and the willingness to use the state to bring it about. Friedman asks two questions: first, what justifies such intervention and second, how effective are those policies that aim to bring it about?

The free-market distributes income according to the value of one's labor and the instruments one uses to produce goods and services. However, many wish to see an equality of income regardless of productivity because they see it as part and parcel of equal treatment. Yet Friedman claims there is no essential connection between equal treatment on the one hand and equal shares of income on the other.

Inequality exists in the market in that different people have different abilities to satisfy the wants of others...