| Ludwig von Mises | The issue is always the same: the government or the market. There is no third solution. | Planned Chaos | p. 28 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Capitalism and socialism are two distinct patterns of social organization. Private control of the means of production and public control are contradictory notions and not merely contrary notions. There is no such thing as a mixed economy, a system that would stand midway between capitalism and socialism. | The Anti-Capitalistic Mentality | pp. 6465 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Capitalism means free enterprise, sovereignty of the consumers in economic matters, and sovereignty of the voters in political matters. Socialism means full government control of every sphere of the individuals life and the unrestricted supremacy of the government in its capacity as central board of production management. | Bureaucracy | p. 10 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | If one rejects laissez faire on account of mans fallibility and moral weakness, one must for the same reason also reject every kind of government action. | Planning for Freedom | p. 44 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Tyranny is the political corollary of socialism, as representative government is the political corollary of the market economy. | Planning for Freedom | p. 218 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | A society that chooses between capitalism and socialism does not choose between two social systems; it chooses between social cooperation and the disintegration of society. Socialism is not an alternative to capitalism; it is an alternative to any system under which men can live as human beings. | Human Action | p. 676; p. 680 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | The desire for an increase of wealth can be satisfied through exchange, which is the only method possible in a capitalist economy, or by violence and petition as in a militarist society, where the strong acquire by force, the weak by petitioning. | Socialism | p. 335 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | For it is an essential difference between capitalist and socialist production that under capitalism men provide for themselves, while under Socialism they are provided for. | Socialism | p. 405 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Liberalism and capitalism address themselves to the cool, well-balanced mind. They proceed by strict logic, eliminating any appeal to the emotions. Socialism, on the contrary, works on the emotions, tries to violate logical considerations by rousing a sense of personal interest and to stifle the voice of reason by awakening primitive instincts. | Socialism | p. 460 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | The salesman thanks the customer for patronizing his shop and asks him to come again. But the socialists say: Be grateful to Hitler, render thanks to Stalin; be nice and submissive, then the great man will be kind to you later too. | Omnipotent Government | p. 53 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | There is simply no other choice than this: either to abstain from interference in the free play of the market, or to delegate the entire management of production and distribution to the government. Either capitalism or socialism: there exists no middle way. | Liberalism | p. 79 | Capitalism vs. Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | There are many socialists who have never come to grips in any way with the problems of economics, and who have made no attempt at all to form for themselves any clear conception of the conditions which determine the character of human society. | Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth | p. 1 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | One may anticipate the nature of the future socialist society. There will be hundreds and thousands of factories in operation. Very few of these will be producing wares ready for use; in the majority of cases what will be manufactured will be unfinished goods and production goods. (1920) | Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth | pp. 2223 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | In the socialist commonwealth every economic change becomes an undertaking whose success can be neither appraised in advance nor later retrospectively determined. There is only groping in the dark. Socialism is the abolition of rational economy. | Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth | p. 26 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Under socialism production is entirely directed by the orders of the central board of production management. The whole nation is an industrial army . . . and each citizen is bound to obey his superiors orders. | Planning for Freedom | p. 72 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | In the bureaucratic machine of socialism the way toward promotion is not achievement but the favor of the superiors. | Bureaucracy | p. 100 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Socialism and democracy are irreconcilable. | A Critique of Interventionism | p. 79 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | The critics of the capitalistic order always seem to believe that the socialistic system of their dreams will do precisely what they think correct. | A Critique of Interventionism | pp. 15657 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | A man who chooses between drinking a glass of milk and a glass of a solution of potassium cyanide does not choose between two beverages; he chooses between life and death. A society that chooses between capitalism and socialism does not choose between two social systems; it chooses between social cooperation and the disintegration of society. Socialism is not an alternative to capitalism; it is an alternative to any system under which men can live as human beings. | Human Action | p. 676; p. 680 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Every socialist is a disguised dictator. | Human Action | p. 689; p. 693 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Economics deals merely with the socialist plans, not with the psychological factors that impel people to espouse the religion of statolatry. | Human Action | p. 689; p. 693 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Men must choose between the market economy and socialism. They cannot evade deciding between these alternatives by adopting a middle-of-the-road position, whatever name they may give to it. | Human Action | p. 857; p. 861 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | In abolishing economic calculation the general adoption of socialism would result in complete chaos and the disintegration of social cooperation under the division of labor. | Human Action | p. 857; p. 861 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Socialism promises not only welfarewealth for allbut universal happiness in love as well. This part of its program has been the source of much of its popularity. | Socialism | p. 74 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Socialism is the renunciation of rational economy. | Socialism | p. 105 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Everything brought forward in favor of Socialism during the last hundred years, in thousands of writings and speeches, all the blood which has been spilt by the supporters of Socialism, cannot make socialism workable. | Socialism | p. 117 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Socialist society is a society of officials. The way of living prevailing in it, and the mode of thinking of its members, are determined by this fact. | Socialism | p. 165 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Socialism knows no freedom of choice in occupation. Everyone has to do what he is told to do and to go where he is sent. | Socialism | p. 165 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | The nationalization of intellectual life, which must be attempted under Socialism, must make all intellectual progress impossible. | Socialism | p. 167 | Socialism |
| Ludwig von Mises | No censor, no emperor, no pope, has ever possessed the power to suppress intellectual freedom which would be possessed by a socialist community. | Socialism | p. 169 | Socialism |