type: timeline_event
Milton Friedman, Nobel Prize-winning University of Chicago economist, begins development of "Free to Choose," a ten-part PBS television series that will bring Chicago School free market ideology to millions of American homes through public broadcasting. Approached by Bob Chitester and the Free to Choose Network in 1977, Friedman and his wife Rose work for three years developing programs that advocate free market principles, deregulation, privatization, and minimal government intervention in economy and society. The timing - same year Feulner transforms Heritage, Koch founds Cato, Simon activates Olin, and Kemp introduces supply-side tax legislation - demonstrates coordinated advancement of free market ideology across multiple media and institutional platforms. Friedman's use of public television to promote corporate-friendly economics represents the media dimension of the Powell Memo strategy, complementing Heritage's policy advocacy, ALEC's model legislation, and Wall Street Journal's editorial promotion of supply-side theory. When the series airs on PBS beginning January 11, 1980, it reaches mass audience just months before Reagan's election, with the companion book becoming the bestselling nonfiction book of 1980. This demonstrates how tax-exempt public broadcasting can be used to advance corporate ideology, reaching audiences far beyond think tank policy papers or academic journals, making Chicago School economics accessible and appealing to ordinary Americans who will vote for politicians implementing those policies.