Friedman did much to prepare the ground for the resurgence in free-market economics that occurred once capitalism had entered a new phase of economic crisis in the 1970s, and was the main driving force behind what became known as ‘monetarist’ economic theory.

Friedman was a New Yorker by birth but made his name at the University of Chicago, where he was Professor of Economics from 1948. His particular brand of free-market economics gave rise to the ‘Chicago School’ of economists who provided much of the intellectual impetus behind Mrs Thatcher’s early years as UK Prime Minister and influenced countless other governments across the world. After his retirement from Chicago, Friedman joined the Hoover Institute and spent considerable time on the lucrative US lecture circuit preaching his free-market creed.

Friedman was a prolific writer on economic matters for much of his life, but his two most well-known works were also the most transparently political: Capitalism and Freedom (1962) and Free To Choose (1980), the latter written jointly with his wife, Rose. Most of his other writings were concerned with monetary economics where he became the guru of those opposed to the dominant economic orthodoxies of the post-war period, particularly Keynesian economics.

The position of Friedman and the Chicago School can be divided into two (related) parts. Firstly, the view that markets are the most efficient way of allocating resources and that government intervention in the economy should be as limited as possible, leaving firms and individuals free to maximise their wealth in competitive markets. Secondly, the view that the massive and persistent rise in price levels across much of the world since the Second World War has been essentially a monetary phenomenon, causing dislocations in the normally efficient workings of the market mechanism, eventually leading to rising unemployment and other economic problems.