I predict that, if anarcho-capitalist institutions appeared in this country tomorrow, heroin would be legal in New York and illegal in most other pla… - David D. Friedman

Economics is that way of understanding behavior that starts from the assumption that people have objectives and tend to choose the correct way to achieve them.

In the ideal socialist state, power will not attract power freaks. People who make decisions will show no slightest bias towards their own interests. There will be no way for a clever man to bend the institutions to serve his own ends. And the rivers will run uphill. (p.108)

Legal rules are to be judged by the structure of incentives they establish and the consequences of people altering their behavior in response to those incentives (p.11)