Quotation of the Day…

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… is from page 263 of economist Lionel Robbins’s wise and still-relevant 1937 book, Economic Planning and International Order:

In a liberal society, the organization of production is controlled by expenditure in the market. The market produces what the consumers choose, bidding for goods according to their incomes. Now for the liberal utilitarian, it is no objection to such a system that the choices which are thus satisfied are not necessarily “good” choices, that the goods which are produced are very often, from his point of view, detestable and vulgar. The liberal does not claim that the satisfactions which result from spontaneous choices are necessarily “good” satisfactions; he claims only that it is possible that they may be. Whereas, he would urge, satisfactions which are chosen for, and imposed upon, adult men and women cannot fall into that category. He would argue that, if we object to the preferences of our fellow citizens, we should try to persuade them to choose otherwise, not deprive them of the right of choice.