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Economics Quotes

Browse 2895 quotes about Economics.

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Economics Quotes

“As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed, and demand a rent even for its natural produce.”

MenCountryNaturalLandProduceDemandEconomicsPropertyReapPrivate PropertyProperty RightsLandlordEconomic InequalityReal Property
Book:An inquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of nations. With notes, and an additional vol., by D. Buchanan
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“The animals that depend on instinct have an inherent knowledge of the laws of economics and of how to apply them; Man, with his powers of reason, has reduced economics to the level of a farce which is at once funnier and more tragic than Tobacco Road.”

MenReasonLawAnimalLevelsEconomicDependsEconomicsInstinctIntuitionTragicInherentTobaccoFarceEconomy And Economics
Book:Collecting Himself: James Thurber on Writing and Writers, Humor and Himself
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“The breakdown of the black community, in order to maintain slavery, began with the breakdown of the black family. Men and women were not legally allowed to get married because you couldn't have that kind of love. It might get in the way of the economics of slavery. Your children could be taken from you and literally sold down the river.”

MenWayKindChildrenMightOrderBlackCommunityTakenMarriedMen And WomenEconomicsRiversSlaveryYour ChildrenBreakdownKinds Of LoveBlack CommunityFamily ManBlack Family
Author:Kerry Washington
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“[Wise men] have tried to understand our state of being, by grasping at its stars, or its arts, or its economics. But, if there is an underlying oneness of all things, it does not matter where we begin, whether with stars, or laws of supply and demand, or frogs, or Napoleon Bonaparte. One measures a circle, beginning anywhere.”

IfsMenDoeArtMatterStatesLawStarsWiseDemandEconomicsAll ThingsCirclesOnenessFrogsGraspingSupply And DemandBonaparte
Book:Lo!
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“We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.”

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Book:Young Statesman
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“Economic power is exercised by means of a positive, by offering men a reward, an incentive, a payment, a value; political power is exercised by means of a negative, by the threat of punishment, injury, imprisonment, destruction. The businessman's tool is values; the bureaucrat's tool is fear.”

MenMeanPoliticalValuesLibertyEconomicCapitalismNegativeEconomicsToolsDestructionThreatRewardsPunishmentInjuryOfferingBusinessmanIncentivesPaymentPolitical PowerBureaucratsImprisonmentEconomic Power
Book:The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z
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“If the ordinary wage-earner worked four hours a day, there would be enough for everybody, and no unemployment — assuming a certain very moderate amount of sensible organization. This idea shocks the well-to-do, because they are convinced that the poor would not know how to use so much leisure.”

IfsKnowsMenWellsLongIdeasEnoughPhilosophyFactsUseWould BeAmericaPoliticalCertainHoursPoorKnow HowFourSonAmountOrdinaryEconomicsOrganizationAssumingConvincedPunishmentShockDislikeSensibleLeisureUnemploymentModeratesGrimLong HoursIndignant
Author:Bertrand Russell
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“America's abundance was created not by public sacrifices to the common good, but by the productive genius of free men who pursued their own personal interests and the making of their own private fortunes. They did not starve the people to pay for America's industrialization. They gave the people better jobs, higher wages, and cheaper goods with every new machine they invented, with every scientific discovery or technological advance- and thus the whole country was moving forward and profiting, not suffering, every step of the way.”

PeopleMenWayCountryWholeJobsAmericaMovingPoliticalSufferingPoliticsInterestCommonPayStepsSacrificeGeniusHigherDiscoveryCapitalismEconomicsMachinesFortuneMoving ForwardAbundanceProductiveGoodsTechnologicalWagesPursuedCheaperFree ManEvery StepCommon GoodBetter JobsScientific DiscoveryIndustrializationPersonal InterestPolitics And Economics
Author:Ayn Rand
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“How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it.”

MenMayHappinessInterestPleasureCompassionPrinciplesSeeingHuman NatureEmpathyEconomicsFortuneInvestingSelfishAltruismSelf InterestWealth Of NationsSelfish MenSelfish Interest
Book:Delphi Complete Works of Adam Smith (Illustrated)
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“Keynes was a great economist. In every discipline, progress comes from people who make hypotheses, most of which turn out to be wrong, but all of which ultimately point to the right answer. Now Keynes, in 'The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money,' set forth a hypothesis which was a beautiful one, and it really altered the shape of economics. But it turned out that it was a wrong hypothesis. That doesn't mean that he wasn't a great man!”

PeopleMenMeanBeautifulTurnsInterestAnswersProgressTheoryDisciplineShapesEconomicsEmploymentGreat MenEconomistHypothesisAlteredRight AnswersKeynes
Author:Milton Friedman
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“The greatest country, the richest country, is not that which has the most capitalists, monopolists, immense grabbings, vast fortunes, with its sad, sad soil of extreme, degrading, damning poverty, but the land in which there are the most homesteads, freeholds - where wealth does not show such contrasts high and low, where all men have enough - a modest living- and no man is made possessor beyond the sane and beautiful necessities.”

MenDoeMadeCountryEnoughShowsBeautifulWealthPovertyLandLowsEconomicsFortuneExtremesInequalitySoilCapitalistContrastSaneImmenseModestDegradingSocial ClassGrabbingHighs And LowsEconomic InequalityWealth InequalityEconomic Equality
Author:Walt Whitman
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“The standard of living of the common man is higher in those countries which have the greatest number of wealthy entrepreneurs.”

MenCountryCommonNumbersLibertyHigherStandardsEconomicsGoldEntrepreneurLibertarianWealthyLibertarianismStandards Of LivingCommon ManGreat Libertarian
Book:Planning for Freedom: Let the Market System Work : a Collection of Essays and Addresses
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“He who acts under an emotional impulse also acts. What distinguishes an emotional action from other actions is the valuation of input and output. Emotions disarrange valuations. Inflamed with passion, man sees the goal as more desirable and the price he has to pay for it as less burdensome than he would in cool deliberation.”

MenActionPassionGoalPayEmotionLibertyEconomicEmotionalEconomicsImpulseDesirableInputOutputDeliberationValuation
Book:Human Action
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“Men have been taught that it is a virtue to agree with others. But the creator is the man who disagrees. Men have been taught that it is a virtue to swim with the current. But the creator is the man who goes against the current. Men have been taught that it is a virtue to stand together. But the creator is the man who stands alone.”

MenHas BeensTogetherLibertyVirtueSocietyEconomicTaughtHe ManEconomicsAgreeCurrentsCreatorInsaneInsanitySwimDisagreeStand AloneFountainhead
Book:The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z
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“The diversity of mankind is a basic postulate of our knowledge of human beings. But if mankind is diverse and individuated, then how can anyone propose equality as an ideal? Every year, scholars hold Conferences on Equality and call for greater equality, and no one challenges the basic tenet. But what justification can equality find in the nature of man? If each individual is unique, how else can he be made 'equal' to others than by destroying most of what is human in him and reducing human society to the mindless uniformity of the ant heap?”

IfsMenYearsHumansMadeIndividualChallengesHuman BeingsLibertyGreaterEconomicMankindEqualDiversityUniqueIdealsEconomicsDestroyingScholarDiverseJustificationConferencesProposeAntsReducingHuman SocietyMindlessNature Of ManUniformity
Book:Man, Economy, and State, Scholar's Edition
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“Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the Capitalistic System was to debauch the currency. . . Lenin was certainly right. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million can diagnose.”

MenWayMeanDoeSaidLawForceProcessSidesLibertyMillionsEconomicEconomicsDestructionBasesBest WayOne ManCurrencyInflationEconomic FreedomBanking SystemMonetary SystemCentral Banking
Book:The Economic Consequences of the Peace: The Economist
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“How you make it in this world, for the most part, depends more on what you do as opposed to whether people like or dislike you. In order to produce a successful life, one must find ways to please his fellow man. That is, find out what goods and services his fellow man values, and is willing to pay for, and then acquire the necessary skills and education to provide it.”

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Author:Walter E. Williams
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“However, if we wish to be compassionate with our fellow man, we must learn to engage in dispassionate analysis. In other words, thinking with our hearts, rather than our brains, is a surefire method to hurt those whom we wish to help.”

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Book:Liberty Versus the Tyranny of Socialism: Controversial Essays
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“America's abundance was not created by public sacrifices to the common good, but by the productive genius of free men who pursued their own personal interests and the making of their own private fortunes.”

MenAmericaInterestCommonLibertySacrificeGeniusEconomicsFortuneLibertarianAbundanceProductiveLibertarianismFree MarketPursuedFree ManCommon GoodIndustrializationPersonal InterestFree Market CapitalismPolitics And Economics
Book:Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal
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“Social Science, is not a 'gay science' but rueful, which finds the secret of this universe in 'supply and demand' and reduces the duty of human governors to that of letting men alone. Not a 'gay science', no, a dreary, desolate, and indeed quite abject and distressing one; what we might call, the dismal science”

MenHumansMightUniverseSocialSecretIgnoranceDutyGayDemandEconomicsGovernorsDrearySocial ScienceDesolateDistressingSupply And Demand
Book:The Selected Works of Thomas Carlyle
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“Without an acquaintance with chemistry, the statesman must remain a stranger to the true vital interests of the state, to the means of its organic development and improvement; ... The highest economic or material interests of a country, the increased and more profitable production of food for man and animals, ... are most closely linked with the advancement and diffusion of the natural sciences, especially of chemistry.”

MenMeanCountryStatesScienceInterestNaturalAnimalKnowledgeEconomicMaterialsDevelopmentHighestEconomicsAccountsProductionsStrangerImprovementChemistryAgricultureLinkedAcquaintanceAdvancementProfitableStatesmenNatural ScienceDiffusion
Book:Familiar Letters on Chemistry, in its relation to Physiology, Dietetics, Agriculture, Commerce and Political Economy: Edited by John Blyth
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“We must show that liberty is not merely one particular value but that it is the source and condition of most moral values. What a free society offers to the individual is much more than what he would be able to do if only he were free. We can therefore not fully appreciate the value of freedom until we know how a society of free men as a whole differs from one in which unfreedom prevails.”

IfsKnowsMenWholeShowsWould BeAbleValuesIndividualLibertyMoralKnow HowConditionsParticularSourceOffersEconomicsAppreciateIndividualityFree ManFree SocietyMoral Values
Author:Friedrich August von Hayek
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