Quotes about Economics

No party has a monopoly on wisdom. No democracy works without compromise. But when Governor Romney and his allies in Congress tell us we can somehow lower our deficit by spending trillions more on new tax breaks for the wealthy - well, you do the math. I refuse to go along with that. And as long as I'm President, I never will.

If Bible lovers paid as much attention to Leviticus 25 as to Leviticus 18, then we might discover that God is at least as interested in economics as in sex.

Long periods of recession, which tend to be self-perpetuating, are usually ended by war, or by preparations for it.

I believe in lower taxes. I believe in more efficient government. I believe in reducing bureaucracy. I believe that we shouldn't have lobbyists who can go in or former government workers who can come back and lobby.

I had also learned that the inseparable twin of racial injustice was economic injustice.

Everybody is on welfare in this country. The problem is that we all too often have socialism for the rich and rugged free enterprise capitalism for the poor. That's the problem. "The Minister to the Valley," February 23, 1968

Capitalism is a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately owned

Economics is also an effective theory, based on the notion of free will plus the assumption that people evaluate their possible alternative courses of action and choose the best. That effective theory is only moderately successful in predicting behavior because, as we all know, decisions are often not rational or are based on a defective analysis of the consequences of the choice. This is why the world is in such a mess.

The strongest force in the universe is Compound Interest.

The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.

Finally—and this is the seventh familiar theme of Venezuelan socialism—there is getting rich off politics. Once again, that does not occur in Scandinavia. There is not a single politician in Norway, Sweden or Denmark who has gone from zero to $10 million—or $200 million—while largely employed in the public sector.

Rivalry is the life of trade, and the death of the trader.