That's the world we live in: when it comes to economics, people have emotions; it's not like chemistry or physics.

Everything reminds Milton of the money supply. Well, everything reminds me of sex, but I keep it out of the paper.

The most obvious things are often right there, but you don't think about them because you've narrowed your vision.

Ideas are useless unless used. The proof of their value is in their implementation. Until then, they are in limbo.

The U.S. is the country that invented progressive taxation of income and of inherited wealth in the 1910s and 20s.

Although I am ready to defend what I have said, many people expect me to defend what others have attributed to me.

Nothing is impossible to the man that can will. Is that necessary? That shall be. This is the only law of success.

For a very long time, and among a large number of peoples, political power has belonged to the owners of the land.

Investment is not only volatile, it is the key motor of the economy's prosperity because it has a snowball effect.

A bet is a tax on bullshit; and it is a just tax, tribute paid by the bullshitters to those with genuine knowledge.

Opponents of globalisation may see it as a new folly, but it is neither particularly new, nor, in general, a folly.

If you take a candy bar in the short run, it gives you a burst of energy, but after a while, it just makes you fat.

To put it mildly, I'm not crazy about the implication that pregnant women are incapable of deciding for themselves.

The differences in income between the poor world and the rich world are so great that people have to be interested.

If NATO goes in and solves the crisis in Darfur, when the next one comes along Africa's leaders will just sit back.

A free society is one in which individuals are free to discover for themselves the available range of alternatives.

Law has been unjustly charged with the whole blame of the calamities resulting from the scheme that bears his name.

While it will be desirable to achieve planned results, it will be even more important to avoid unplanned disasters.

The sense of responsibility in the financial community for the community as a whole is not small. It is nearly nil.

I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas.

Now virtue may not always be its own reward, but in any case it is not usually bought and paid for at market rates.

Only government can take perfectly good paper, cover it with perfectly good ink and make the combination worthless.

The State is a gang of thieves writ large - the most immoral, grasping and unscrupulous individuals in any society.

The lens of contract focuses predominantly on gains from trade whereas orthodoxy is focused on resource allocation.

Progressives regard government as the white knight that protects the public from the greed of capitalists. If only.

I don't care who writes a nation's laws - or crafts its advanced treaties - if I can write its economics textbooks.

Manufacturers of food try to get the optimal ratio to tap into your impulsivity. They don't care about your health.

Keynes was a very good economist. He was brilliant. He had wonderful insights. His work has inspired me many times.

It's important to realize that innovation and growth in itself are not sufficient to moderate inequality of wealth.

The U.S. is the country that invented progressive taxation of income and of inherited wealth in the 1910s and '20s.

Any politician who can be elected only by turning Americans against other Americans is too dangerous to be elected.

Liberals are very broadminded: they are always willing to give careful consideration to both sides of the same side

If pornographers are among the early adopters of the new technology, then it has definite commercial possibilities.

Once Congress establishes that one person can live at the expense of another, it pays for everyone to try to do so.

[Globalization] has enriched the world scientifically and culturally and benefited many people economically as well.

Building a rainy-day fund during good times may not be politically popular, but it can pay off during the bad times.

I don't go to the beach. There is no value in going to the beach. If I did go I would probably read economics books.

Legal plunder has two roots: One, as we have just seen, is in human selfishness; the other is in false philanthropy.

If we can reduce the risk of friction likely to lead to war, this is probably all we can reasonably hope to achieve.

When Uganda got debt relief in 1999, the first item President Museveni bought was a presidential jacket for himself.

...it is distressing how often one can guess the answer given to an economic question merely by knowing who asks it.

It's not just about the current economic environment. History shows that slashing budgets always leads to recession.

We used to be calorie poor and now the problem is obesity. We used to be data poor, now the problem is data obesity.

...within ten years 80% of our economic legislation, perhaps even fiscal and social as well' would come from the EU.

The laws of normal economics dictate that lower taxes combined with increased spending will lead to bigger deficits.

The tourist business is a trap, it is a tained honey; Man clearly should have stayed in bed, and not invented money.

It is the institutions of society, not parental genes, that bestow the blessings of ownership of productive capital.

In principle, junk bonds are basically useful, but they are used excessively and irrationally, notably in takeovers.

A minimum-wage law is, in reality, a law that makes it illegal for an employer to hire a person with limited skills.

I would say that in this world, the greatest source of inequality has been special privileges granted by government.

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