Credit where it's not due
Sir: Attracting false attributions is evidently one of Professor Milton Friedman's many talents. He did not coin the maxim, 'There is no such thing as a free lunch', which is commonly credited to him, nor did he invent what Christopher Fildes calls Fried- man's Law (City and suburban, 4 April). I published a concise version of it on 29 February 1988 as `Linacre's Law' and was promptly rebuked by friends who had heard something similar ten years earlier still.
Moreover, the essential contrast in impact of the Four Types of Money is missing from Mr Fildes's account. Here is the original, in its most revealing yet succinct form: If I spend my own money on myself, my first concern is quality and my second is price. If I
spend my own money on someone else, my first concern is price and my second is quality. If I spend other people's money on myself, then price and quality have equal priority. If I spend other people's money on other people, then neither quality nor price matters at all.
Vivian Linacre
45 Montgomery Street, Edinburgh
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