Today's papers will be filled with tributes to the scholarly contributions of Milton Friedman, who died yesterday at the age of 94. They will note the way that the great economist invented modern monetarism. And the fact that Milton vanquished orthodox Keynesianism with a single phrase — "inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon." Then there is how Milton inspired Paul Volcker to push interest rates to the sky to stop inflation, an event whose benefits we still see in the shape of the yield curve today. Yet there is something Friedman did that is less talked about. He showed us that free markets are humane.

Consider how Americans have viewed economics for much of the past three-quarters of a century — the period since Roosevelt blamed the Depression on "princes of property." Americans have always understood that free-marketeers might have valid arguments. But for decades, profit was generally considered corrupting. You made money so you could move on and do good in other areas, such as government or charity. Not only Marxists, but also the mainstream believed this. In 1958 Friedman's own academic home, the University of Chicago, published a book titled "The Perils of Prosperity." Traditional market theories were perceived to be cold, anti-people.

As for free-marketeers themselves, they were likewise deemed heartless. I grew up in Chicago's Hyde Park, a walk away from Milton's own economics department at the University of Chicago. Even as a child I was aware that people beat a path around that department's doors, if only to avoid being skewered by its cerebral inhabitants — led by Milton.

In fact, what Milton was doing all that time was methodically demonstrating how market-oriented thought was more humane than any charity — not to mention welfare. The performance happened, first of all, on a professional level. In the 1960s, appalled at welfare, he floated the concept of a negative income tax to replace it. Such a tax, he recognized, would encourage people to work and help their families in the longer term. The Earned Income Tax Credit has its problems, but it has reduced unemployment. By the Clinton era the EITC, a version of the old right-winger's concept, had become a favorite policy tool of the Democratic Party.

In the 1970s — to much outrage — Friedman's colleagues, under his influence, convinced General Augusto Pinochet to privatize and liberalize Chile's economy. Friedman believed that a life of markets would pull Pinochet's country out of trouble, and for years since then, Chile's growth rate did proceed to outpace that of the rest of Latin America.

The 2006 World Health Report, put out by the World Health Organization, shows that the chances of a Chilean dying before he reaches the age of 5 is nine in 1,000, compared with 28 in 1,000 for Mexico and the eight in 1,000 that obtains for America. Even by measures important in the nonprofit sector, the Chile that Friedmanites formed is a success.

But to focus on these details is to omit Milton's personal humanity. Friedman won the Nobel, and "Capitalism and Freedom," the book he wrote with his wife, Rose, gave him financial resources. The Friedmans used those resources to create a school voucher foundation, targeting the poorest children. Now voucher programs have proliferated in the past 10 years across the country.

He was a great teacher, though a no-nonsense critic. Once I hazarded that a certain bit of tax legislation was imperfect — "any tax cut is good," he snapped back. At another point, a friend told him I was thinking of starting a nonprofit for free markets. Milton wrote directly to me to tell me that there were too many charities in the world. "One of my main reasons for favoring elimination of the death tax is because doing so would reduce the flow of funds into nonprofit areas. It would lead to a larger fraction of accumulated wealth being invested in productive enterprises," wrote Milton. If markets needed fighting for, I should do it through prose — "You will do more in this direction by your writing than by your organizing."

There was always a strong sense of friendship emanating from him and Rose. Though we weren't really well acquainted, he invited my children, our babysitter, and me to visit them in their San Francisco apartment. We still have the Polaroid photos of our boys posing before the Friedmans' knees. Nor am I alone. I am one of hundreds of people whose careers the Friedmans have helped push forward, with free-market advice — and affection.

As it happened, I learned of Milton's death while leaving a lunch at the Council on Foreign Relations for Muhammad Yunus, the winner of this year's Nobel Peace Prize. Mr. Yunus got the prize for making micro-lending to the poor a worldwide phenomenon through his Grameen Bank.

Both for-profit and not-for-profit people sat in the audience — two worlds. Yet when Mr. Yunus told us, "I'm not saying that money is dirty," every head in the room nodded. We all nodded again when Mr. Yunus said a good maxim should be "I shall never seek a job" — even beggars ought to think about creating jobs, not mearly taking them. To us, these arguments seemed almost obvious. But Mr. Yunus, like so many, would have found them much harder to make, had not Milton made them before him.

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