Interviewer: Let me ask you this question about human rights. You’ve spoken favorably about the right to the freedom of speech and other human rights; but I assume you would not ascent to the usual list of rights so much publicized these days, such as: the right to a minimum standard of living, the right to the equality of opportunity, the right to a free education and so on. Why? What is the basis of the distinction?
Ayn Rand: Well there you have a complete contradiction! This concept of rights demands, as a right, values which do not in fact belong to man in nature. In other words, the right to a minimum sustenance means that a man without any effort on his part is entitled to sustain his life. Well since nature does not provide men with a minimum sustenance, the only way of maintaining or implementing such a right would be to breach, infringe and deny the right of some other man. It means that some other man is charged with the un-chosen responsibility to support the man who is guaranteed the minimum sustenance. It means that some men are to be enslaved to the minimum or maximum needs of others. Not only is it a vicious concept but whichever you might wish to call it, it cannot possibly be called a right. Nobody could in fact maintain the right of some men to enslave others.
…Since nobody gets any production, any material values, any physical substance from nature itself, nobody has the right to claim any minimum guarantee because it can come only from other men, and nobody can claim the right to enslave other men.
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