As we have reiterated, economics cannot by itself establish ethical judgments, and it can and should be developed in a Wertfrei manner. This is true whether we adopt the modern disjunction between fact and value, or whether we adhere to the classical philosophical tradition that there can be a “science of ethics.” For even if there can be, economics may not by itself establish it.

If the economist qua economist must be Wertfrei, does this leave him any room for significant pronouncements on questions of public policy? Superficially, it would seem not, but this entire work has been testimony to the contrary.

Praxeological analysis of comparative politico-economic systems can be starkly summed up in the following table:

After disposing to his own satisfaction of the basic natural-rights postulates, Oliver goes on to attack a specific class of these rights: freedom of contract.33 Oliver delineates three possible freedom-of-contract clauses: (1) “A man has a right to freedom of contract”; (2) “A man has a right to freedom of contract unless the terms of the contract harm someon

On the free market every man obtains money income insofar as he can sell his goods or services for money. Everyone’s income will vary in accordance with freely chosen market valuations of his productivity in fulfilling consumer desires.

Some years ago, Professor Henry M. Oliver published an important study: a logical analysis of ethical goals in economic affairs.30 Professor Kenneth J.

Oliver begins by turning his guns on the natural-rights defense of laissez faire—on the system of natural liberty.32 He is worried because Americans still seem to cling to this doctrine in underlying theory, if not in actual practice.

Action sorts and grades; originally it knows only ordinal numbers, not cardinal numbers. But the external world to which acting man must adjust his conduct is a world of quantitative determinateness. In this world there exist quantitative relations between cause and effect. If it were otherwise, if definite things could render unlimited services, such things would never be scarce and could not be dealt with as means.

One of the most common charges levelled against the free market (even by many of its friends) is that it reflects and encourages unbridled “selfish materialism.” Even if the free market—unhampered capitalism—best furthers man’s “material” ends, critics argue, it distracts man from higher ideals. It leads man away from spiritual or intellectual values and atrophies any spirit of altruism.