Economics Quotes - Page 24

• The march of invention has clothed mankind with powers of which a century ago the boldest imagination could not have dreamt.

  Henry George

  Philosophy, Imagination, Political

  Louis Freeland Post, Henry George (1899). “The Single Tax: An Explanation, with Colored Charts and Illustrated Notes of the Land, Labor, and Fiscal Reform Advocated by Henry George”

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• The methods by which a trade union can alone act, are necessarily destructive; its organization is necessarily tyrannical.

  Henry George

  Philosophy, Organization, Political

  Henry George (1911). “perplexed philosopher [Herbert Spencer”

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• Whatever you tax you get less of.

  Alan Greenspan

  Economy, Taxes

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• Protectionism will do little to create jobs and if foreigners retaliate, we will surely lose jobs.

  Alan Greenspan

  Jobs, Philosophy, Political

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• To be controlled in our economic pursuits means to be controlled in everything.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Mean, Historical, Pursuit

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• Socialism has never and nowhere been at first a working-class movement. It is by no means an obvious remedy for the obvious evil which the interests of that class will necessarily demand. It is a construction of theorists.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Philosophy, Mean, Class

  "Studies in Philosophy, Politics and Economics". Book by Friedrich Hayek, The Intellectuals and Socialism (ch. 12), 1967.

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• Socialist thought owes its appeal to the young largely to its visionary character; the very courage to indulge in Utopian thought is in this respect a source of strength for socialism which traditional liberalism sadly lacks. Speculation about general principles provides an opportunity for the play of the imagination of those who are unencumbered by much knowledge of the facts of present-day life. Their ideas suffer from inherent contradictions, and any attempt to put them into practice must produce something utterly different from what they expect.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Philosophy, Character, Opportunity

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• It is perhaps the most characteristic feature of the intellectual that he judges new ideas not by their specific merits but by the readiness with which they fit into his general conceptions, into the picture of the world which he regards as modern or advanced.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Philosophy, Ideas, Judging

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• Everything we get, outside of the free gifts of nature, must in some way be paid for. The world is full of so- called economists who in turn are full of schemes for getting something for nothing. They tell us that the government can spend and spend without taxing at all; that it can continue to pile up debt without ever paying it off, because "we owe it to ourselves."

  Henry Hazlitt

  Philosophy, Government, Free Gifts

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• On Positive Liberty: The business of the State is to use its organizing powers for the purpose of furnishing the necessary conditions which allow this people freely to unfold its creative faculties.

  Adolf Hitler

  Philosophy, People, Creative

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• Unalienable rights are essential limitations to all governments.

  Francis Hutcheson

  Philosophy, Rights, Government

  Francis Hutcheson (1753). “An inquiry into the original of our ideas of beauty and virtue”, p.301

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• I, place economy among the first & most important republican virtues, & public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared

  Thomas Jefferson

  Philosophy, Political, Important

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• Gold is a relic from a time when government's were less trustworthy in these matters (currency debasement) than they are now.

  John Maynard Keynes

  Philosophy, Government, Political

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• Goods move in response to price differences from points of low to points of higher price, the movement tending to obliterate the price difference and come to rest.

  Frank Knight

  Philosophy, Moving, Differences

  Frank Hyneman Knight (1997). “The Ethics of Competition”, p.180, Transaction Publishers

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• There is no sense in making statements that will not continue to be true after they are made.

  Frank Knight

  Philosophy, Political, Made

  Frank Hyneman Knight (1997). “The Ethics of Competition”, p.178, Transaction Publishers

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• People respond to incentives. If unemployment becomes more attractive because of the unemployment benefit, some unemployed workers may no longer try to find a job or may not try to find one as quickly as they would without the benefit.

  Paul Krugman

  Jobs, Philosophy, People

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• Generous unemployment benefits can increase both structural and frictional unemployment. So government policies intended to help workers can have the undesirable side effect of raising the natural rate of unemployment.

  Paul Krugman

  Philosophy, Government, Political

  Paul Krugman, Robin Wells (2012). “CourseSmart E-Book for Macroeconomics: A PDF-style E-Book”, p.227, Palgrave Macmillan

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• Raising the minimum wage and lowering the barriers to union organization would carry a trade-off - higher unemployment. A better idea is to have the government subsidize low-wage employment. The earned-income tax credit for low-income workers - which has been the object of proposed cuts by both President Clinton and congressional Republicans - has been a positive step in this direction.

  Paul Krugman

  Philosophy, Cutting, Government

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• I've always believed that a speculative bubble need not lead to a recession, as long as interest rates are cut quickly enough to stimulate alternative investments. But I had to face the fact that speculative bubbles usually are followed by recessions. My excuse has been that this was because the policy makers moved too slowly - that central banks were typically too slow to cut interest rates in the face of a burst bubble, giving the downturn time to build up a lot of momentum.

  Paul Krugman

  Philosophy, Cutting, Long

  "Actually, Krugman Was A Huge Advocate Of The Housing Boom" by Joe Weisenthal, www.businessinsider.com. June 17, 2009.

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• In fact, I'd say that the sources of the economy's expansion from 2003 to 2007 were, in order, the housing bubble, the war, and - very much in third place - tax cuts.

  Paul Krugman

  Philosophy, War, Cutting

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• Governments do not necessarily act in the national interest, especially when making detailed microeconomic interventions. Instead, they are influenced by interest group pressures. The kinds of interventions that new trade theory suggests can raise national income will typically raise the welfare of small, fortunate groups by large amounts, while imposing costs on larger, more diffuse groups.

  Paul Krugman

  Philosophy, Government, Political

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• It should be possible to emphasize to students that the level of employment is a macroeconomic issue, depending in the short run on aggregate demand and depending in the long run on the natural rate of unemployment, with microeconomic policies like tariffs having little net effect. Trade policy should be debated in terms of its impact on efficiency, not in terms of phoney numbers about jobs created or lost.

  Paul Krugman

  Running, Jobs, Philosophy

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• Close the weak banks and impose serious capital requirements on the strong ones...You see, it may sound hard-hearted, but you cannot keep unsound financial institutions operating simply because they provide jobs.

  Paul Krugman

  Strong, Jobs, Philosophy

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• Only now did I recognize the reciprocal relationship which exists between manufacturing power and the national system of transportation, and that the one can never develop to its fullest without the other.

  Friedrich List

  Philosophy, Political, Transportation

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• Capital is that part of wealth which is devoted to obtaining further wealth.

  Alfred Marshall

  Philosophy, Political, Wealth

  Alfred Marshall, Mary Paley Marshall (1888). “The Economics of Industry”

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