presupposes a much more complete agreement on the relative importance of the different ends than actually exists, and that, in consequence, in order … - F.A. Hayek

The argument for collectivism is simple if false; it is an immediate emotional argument. The argument for individualism is subtle and sophisticated; it is an indirect rational argument.

We can unfortunately not indefinitely extend the sphere of common action and still leave the individual free in his own sphere. Once the communal sector, in which the state controls all the means, exceeds a certain proportion of the whole, the effects of its actions dominate the whole system. Although the state controls directly the use of only a large part of the available resources, the effects of its decisions on the remaining part of the economic system become so great that indirectly it controls almost everything.

The chief signifi cance of the comprehensive systems of unemployment compensation that have been adopted in all Western countries, however, is that they operate in a labor market dominated by the coercive action of unions and that they have been designed under strong union influence with the aim of assisting the unions in their wage policies. A system in which a worker is regarded as unable to fi nd employment and therefore is entitled to benefit because the workers in the fi rm or industry in which he seeks employment are on strike necessarily becomes a major support of union wage pressure. Such a system, which relieves the unions of the responsibility for the unemployment that their policies create and which places on the state the burden not merely of maintaining but of keeping content those who are kept out of jobs by them, can in the long run only make the employment problem more acute.