Freedom, in the context of economics, is the right of man to engage in voluntary economic activities (e.g. trade) for his benefit. There are a few key factors that must be made lucid:

"Voluntary" here means without unlawful government interference. In other words, when duplicity is involved, the government has both the right and responsibility to administer justice and repair grievances. However, man has the right to financially interact with others in society without government dictating the conditions.

The aforementioned role of government is only possible if there is recognition of property rights as incontrovertible. Man must acquire and use if he is to survive. Therefore, a right to property is a corollary and a means to his right to life. Without the use of property, man is subject to the demands of others and bereft of personal sovereignty. In legitimate social systems, governments strictly adhere to citizens' rights to property.

"Economic activities for his benefit" means man is the beneficiary of his own action. Or, he cannot be coerced by the state to surrender his earnings. Presupposing he is engaging in lawful activities (i.e. not violating the rights of others), man must hold his life as the standard of value from which all other values derive. As such, he alone is appropriate in deciding how to use his profits.

This reality is only possible through capitalism. Capitalism is necessarily a function of limited government in conjunction with the recognition of the rights of man. Moreover, capitalism extrinsically provides "cost versus benefit" justifications for its superiority. History is littered with examples that nations who adopt capitalist policies experience greater prosperity, and not merely out of coincidence.

What is important, however, is not that capitalism is simply beneficial, but that it is moral. Capitalism is moral since it acknowledges the rights of man. It is the only social system that recognizes man's rights as paramount and indomitable.

Again, economic freedom is not freedom from want. Freedom as defined by satisfactory levels of existence necessarily encroaches upon the rights of others. If one is to be nurtured and cared for, then there would be a systematic requirement that all needs are always met by others in society, whether through their labor or wealth. There is no such thing as a right to the unearned and such a statement is a contradiction in terms. This type of system would prescribe citizens to work for the needs of others under coercion, and thus, violate their rights. French philosopher and economist Frederic Bastiat echoes this idea succinctly:

See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime.

Recall the U.S. system is based on life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. One is owed the pursuit, not the happiness.

Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman believed societies that place equality of outcomes prior to equality of opportunity achieve neither. History has repeatedly affirmed this sentiment and has done so with capitalism as its argument.