Editorial: Prophecies and Profits

Abstract

Milton Friedman has argued that the social responsibility of business is to increase its profits. He has also predicted that Britain's economy will collapse with a consequent loss of freedom and democracy. Can British managers reconcile these views of the most esteemed living political economist? The outlook both for themselves and for the economy may hardly be conducive to developing a new sense of entrepreneurial mission but the Editor of JGM argues that this is precisely what they must do. For once their social responsibilities are clear: they must generate profits and jobs. This adaptation of Milton Friedman's famous dictum is the only way his depressing prophecies for the British economy can be proved false.