Gross Domestic Product Quotes

• World military spending has now risen to over $1.2 trillion. This incredible sum represents 2.5 per cent of GDP (global gross domestic product). Even if 1 per cent of it were redirected towards development, the world would be much closer to achieving the Millennium Development Goals.

  Ban Ki-moon

  Military, Gdp, Goal

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• The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our gross domestic product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on the ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart - not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

  Barack Obama

  Heart, Opportunity, Charity

  First Presidential Inaugural Address, Delivered 20 January 2009

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• At present we are stealing the future, selling it in the present, and calling it gross domestic product.

  Paul Hawken

  Calling, Stealing, Selling

  Paul Hawken's Commencement Address at University of Portland in Portland, Oregon, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 2, 2014.

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• GDP does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play

  Robert Kennedy

  Children, Play, Gdp

  Robert F. Kennedy (1998). “Make Gentle the Life of the World: The Vision of Robert F. Kennedy”, Harcourt

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• ...the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.

  Robert Kennedy

  Marriage, Country, Children

  Robert F. Kennedy, Edwin O. Guthman (1993). “RFK: collected speeches”, Viking Pr

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• We are misery-making machines! Homo sapiens has perfected the art of causing suffering. Pain is humankind's collective GDP.

  Henry Rollins

  Art, Pain, Gdp

  "Pain and Gain" by Henry Rollins, www.laweekly.com. March 6, 2014.

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• Housing has led our nation's economic expansion over the past few years, accounting for 16 percent of our Gross Domestic Product. New housing starts and home sales hit record levels from 2003 through 2005.

  Randy Neugebauer

  Home, Past, Years

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• I just think that - when a country needs more income and we do, we're only taking in 15 percent of GDP, I mean, that - that - when a country needs more income, they should get it from the people that have it.

  Warren Buffett

  Country, Mean, Thinking

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• And it was back in the mid-1980s, and as I point out in a piece, that was when we are spending about eight percent of our gross domestic product on health care. And even then, we had the impression that so much of the excessive, aggressive medical treatment that took place at the end of life was not only unnecessary but it was cruel.

  Richard Dooling

  Eight, Pieces, Care

  "Op-Ed: Cut Health Care Spending On The Elderly". "Talk of the Nation" with Rebecca Roberts, www.npr.org. August 17, 2009.

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• The price of imported oil in the US doubled between summer 2003 and summer 2005, reducing consumers' purchasing power by more than 1 per cent of gross domestic product.

  Martin Feldstein

  Summer, Oil, Purchasing Power

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• The GDP approach doesn't address many aspects of human life: health, education, political liberty, religious liberty, employment opportunities. And these are not all that well correlated with gross domestic product. We also have to think about equality among groups. And freedom of speech and religion. China always ranks near the top of developing countries these days, but there are lots of things we might see as lacking in China.

  Martha C. Nussbaum

  Country, Religious, Thinking

  Source: www.neh.gov

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• Gross National Happiness is more important than Gross Domestic Product. attr to Buthan's King Jigme Singye Wangchuck

  John Robbins

  Kings, Important, Products

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• While we have put an utmost emphasis on Gross Domestic Products (GDP) as a barometer for the overall economy until now, we have not paid much attention in detecting a level of social welfare. We, as a member of the society, must now take steps to create an index to indicate other critical elements to be focused on in order to restore reliability of world statistics.

  Jose Angel Gurria

  Order, Gdp, Elements

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• Economics was like psychology, a pseudoscience trying to hide that fact with intense theoretical hyperelaboration. And gross domestic product was one of those unfortunate measurement concepts, like inches or the British thermal unit, that ought to have been retired long before.

  Kim Stanley Robinson

  Long, Psychology, Trying

  Kim Stanley Robinson (2003). “Blue Mars”, p.105, Spectra

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• The federal investment in finding cures for cancer - $3 billion annually [as of 1999] - is less than ... zero ... point ... zero ... zero ... zero ... four ... percent of our gross domestic product, or about one-seventh of what Americans spend on beauty products.

  Michael Milken

  Zero, Cancer, Four

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• If you look at payments to labor as a proportion of national income or gross domestic product, you find profits going way up, investment and savings going up.

  Michael Hudson

  Income, Looks, Saving

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

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• Between 2001 and 2011, Brazil lifted 20 million people out of poverty and into its growing middle class, and in the last quarter of the twentieth century Botswana's gross domestic product per capita grew faster than that of any other country on the planet. The once-labeled 'Third World' is edging its way into the 'First World.'

  Peter Blair Henry

  Country, Class, People

  Peter Blair Henry, Peter Henry (2013). “Turnaround: Third World Lessons for First World Growth”, p.6, Basic Books

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• The economy of the United States gross domestic product doubled from 1996 to 2015, doubled, more than, $8.8 trillion to $17.1 trillion. And the median household income went down.

  Mark Shields

  United States, Income, Economy

  Source: www.pbs.org

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• Our gross domestic product, or GDP, is barely above 1 percent. And going down.

  Donald Trump

  Gdp, Percent, Products

  Donald Trump's Speech Responding To Assault Accusations, www.npr.org. October 13, 2016.

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• In India, 100 of the richest people own assets worth 25% of the gross domestic product. There's something terribly wrong. No individual and no corporation should be allowed to amass that kind of unlimited wealth, including bestselling writers like myself, who are showered with royalties.

  Arundhati Roy

  People, Corporations, India

  Source: www.truth-out.org

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• The political establishment has brought about the destruction of our factories, and our jobs, as they flee to Mexico, China and other countries all around the world. Our just-announced job numbers are anemic. Our gross domestic product, or GDP, is barely above 1 percent. And going down. Workers in the United States are making less than they were almost 20 years ago, and yet they are working harder.

  Donald Trump

  Country, Jobs, Gdp

  Trump's campaign rally in West Palm Beach, FL, October 13, 2016.

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• With a chip on his shoulder larger than his margin of victory, Barack Obama is approaching his second term by replicating the mistake of his first. Then his overreaching involved health care - expanding the entitlement state at the expense of economic growth. Now he seeks another surge of statism, enlarging the portion of gross domestic product grasped by government and dispensed by politics. The occasion is the misnamed "fiscal cliff," the proper name for which is: the Democratic Party's agenda.

  George Will

  Mistake, Party, Government

  "A cliff of Democrats' choosing" by George Will, www.washingtonpost.com. November 28, 2012.

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• Today, you have 20 percent of the world controlling 80 percent of the Gross Domestic Product; you've got a $30 trillion (US) world economy, and $24 trillion of it is in the developed countries... These inequities can't exist. So if you are talking about systemic breakdown, I think you have to look in terms of social breakdown.

  James Wolfensohn

  Country, Thinking, Talking

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• Cold-turkey deficit reduction would cause a significant recession. A recent analysis by the Congressional Budget Office estimated that going headlong over the cliff would cause our gross domestic product, which has been growing at an annual rate of around 2 percent, to fall at a rate of 2.9 percent in the first half of 2013.

  Christina Romer

  Fall, Turkeys, Office

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• We have spoken on many occasions of the need to achieve high economic growth as an absolute priority for our country. The annual address for 2003 set for the first time the goal of doubling gross domestic product within a decade.

  Vladimir Putin

  Country, Goal, Priorities

  Annual Address to the Federal Assembly, en.kremlin.ru. May 10, 2006.

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