Cited on HN 3 times, 2022–2026, never outright recommendedscore 0
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026
HN commenters use it to show that even the best-known free-market economist supported putting a price on pollution.
A two-minute clip from a 1979 Phil Donahue interview in which Milton Friedman makes the free-market case for taxing pollution. He treats pollution as an externality that can be given a price.
“Even Mr. Free Market himself, Milton Friedman, thought a price on pollution was a good idea” (HN, 2026)
AFAIK, Mises.org is generally well regarded among libertarians. Libertarians generally argue that externalities should either be illegal or taxed, when there are no other practical solutions. Here's a video of Milton Friedman on the topic: [this video]
Friedman on handling externalities such as pollution.
Even Mr. Free Market™ himself, Milton Friedman, didn't have a problem with putting a price on pollution as it is a form of externality: * [this video] Greenspan, Volcker, Bernanke, Yellen, etc , also endorsed a price on carbon (which revenue would be refunded to people): * [link]
Friedman accepted pricing pollution as an externality.
> Agreed. The market should decide if beef consumption is viable. Until The Market™, especially in the US, starts dealing with externalities (like climate change), it should not. Something like carbon pricing (per Greenspan and Volcker): * [link] * [link] Even Mr. Free Market himself, Milton Friedman, thought a price on pollution was a good idea: * [this video]
Friedman thought a price on pollution was a good idea.
Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.
3 Hacker News comments
From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.