Sixteen per cent of the national income went on armaments. Another 4 per cent went on the MVD [Ministry of the Interior] and KGB [Committee of State Security]. That makes a total of 20 per cent. The highest military expenditures in the world. In no other country does this figure exceed 8 per cent. The country was ruined, the people were kept half starved, agriculture was in a mess, all to have the rockets. And this was called the class approach. If that is socialism it can go to hell.

Government should retreat from micromanaging a lot of things the government is incapable of doing … The government should focus on macroeconomic issues, such as setting the rules of the market, on effectively enforcing these rules as administrator and regulator.

The purpose of the social state in the society of consumers is, just as it was in the society of producers, to defend society against the ‘collateral damage’ that the guiding principle of life would cause if not monitored, controlled and constrained. It is meant to protect society against the multiplying of the ranks of ‘collateral victims’ of consumerism – the excluded, the outcasts, the underclass. Its task is to salvage human solidarity from erosion and to keep the sentiments of ethical responsibility from fading.