No analysis of the limits of economic freedom or the uses of coercion by government, labor unions, or organizations of any kind can do justice to the complexity of the subject without taking account of the distinction between collective and noncollective goods.
― Mancur Olson
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No analysis of the limits of economic freedom or the uses of coercion by government, labor unions, or organizations of any kind can do justice to the complexity of the subject without taking account of the distinction between collective and noncollective goods.
― Mancur Olson
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A theory of power has long been the Holy Grail for political science, but the Grail has not been found.
― Mancur Olson
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The spontaneous individual optimization that drives the theories with which I began is important, but it is not enough by itself. If spontaneous Coase‐style bargains, whether through laissez-faire or political bargaining and government, eliminated socially wasteful predation and obtained the institutions that are needed for a thriving market economy, then there would not be so many grossly inefficient and poverty-stricken societies.
― Mancur Olson
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To say a situation is ‘lost’ or hopeless is in one sense equivalent to saying it is perfect, for in both cases efforts at improvement can bring no positive results.
― Mancur Olson
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Distributional coalitions slow down a society’s capacity to adopt new technologies and to reallocate resources in response to changing conditions, and thereby reduce the rate of economic growth.
― Mancur Olson
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