The art of economics consists in looking not merely at the immediate but at the longer effects of any act or policy; it consists in tracing the consequences of that policy not merely for one group but for all groups.
Henry Hazlitt
There is only one difference between a bad economist and a good one: The bad economist confines himself to the visible effect; the good economist takes into account both the effect that can be seen and those effects that must be foreseen.
Frederic Bastiat
There are people who think that plunder loses all its immorality as soon as it becomes legal. Personally, I cannot imagine a more alarming situation.
Frederic Bastiat
The state is the great fictitious entity by which everybody seeks to live at the expense of everybody else.
Frederic Bastiat
Panics do not destroy capital; they merely reveal the extent to which it has been previously destroyed by its betrayal into hopelessly unproductive works.
John Stuart Mill
Take care of the means, and the ends will take care of themselves.
Mahatma Ghandi
Progress is precisely that which the rules and regulations did not foresee.
Ludwig von Mises
It is true, in the market the various consumers have not the same voting right. The rich cast more votes than the poor citizens. But this inequality is itself the outcome of a previous voting process. To be rich, in a pure market economy, is the outcome of success in filling best the demands of the consumers.
Ludwig von Mises
Property, therefore, like human economy, is not an arbitrary invention but rather the only practically possible solution of the problem that is, in the nature of things, imposed upon us by the disparity between requirements for, and available quantities of, all economic goods.
Carl Menger
Special interest politics is a simple game. A hundred people sit in a circle, each with his pocket full of pennies. A politician walks around the outside of the circle, taking a penny from each person. No one minds; who cares about a penny? When he has gotten all the way around the circle, the politician throws fifty cents down in front of one person, who is overjoyed at the unexpected windfall. That process is repeated, ending with a different person. After a hundred rounds everyone is a hundred cents poorer, fifty cents richer, and happy.
David Friedman
Those who would sacrifice essential liberties for a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Ben Franklin
I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.
James Madison, father of the U.S. Constitution
With respect to the two words "general welfare," I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.
James Madison, father of the U.S. Constitution
I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious.
Thomas Jefferson
Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then, be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the forms of kings to govern him?
Thomas Jefferson
A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the public treasure. From that moment on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most money from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy followed by a dictatorship.
Professor Alexander Tyler
If some among you fear taking a stand because you are afraid of reprisals from customers, clients, or even government, recognize that you are just feeding the crocodile hoping he'll eat you last.
Ronald Reagan
I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.
Barry Goldwater
The more corrupt the State the more numerous the laws.
Cornelius Tacitus
Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.
Ayn Rand
To deal with men by force is as impractical as to deal with nature by persuasion.
Ayn Rand
Both the oligarch and tyrant mistrust the people, and therefore deprive them of arms.
Aristotle
Government control gives rise to fraud, suppression of Truth, intensification of the black market and artificial scarcity. Above all, it unmans the people and deprives them of initiative, it undoes the teaching of self-help...I look upon an increase in the power of the State with the greatest fear because, although while apparently doing good by minimizing exploitation, it does the greatest harm to mankind by destroying individuality which lies at the heart of all progress...Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the Act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest....We find the general work of mankind is being carried on from day to day be the mass of people acting as if by instinct....If they were instinctively violent the world would end in no time...It is when the mass mind is unnaturally influenced by wicked men that the mass of mankind commit violence. But they forget it as they commit it because they return to their peaceful nature immediately the evil influence of the directing mind has been removed....A government that is evil has no room for good men and women except in its prisons.
Mohandas Gandhi
Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act of depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest.
Mahatma Ghandi
If you had asked me whether singing "Sweet Georgia Brown" in Polish would be funny, I would have said "No." But, when Mel Brooks and Anne Bancroft sang it as a duet in Polish, I laughed so hard that my sides literally hurt. That is why Mel Brooks is a genius of comedy and I am not. Most of us -- if not all of us -- are grossly incompetent at other people's jobs. That is why it is so dangerous to have politicians telling doctors, farmers, bankers, entrepreneurs and others what to do.
Thomas Sowell
"What can we do to promote world peace?" Mother Theresa was asked when she received the Nobel Prize. Her answer: "Go home and love your family."
Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm -- but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.
T.S. Eliot
You cannot bring about prosperity discouraging thrift.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot help small men by tearing down big men.
You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income.
You cannot further brotherhood of men by inciting class hatred.
You cannot establish sound security on borrowed money.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away a man’s initiative.
You cannot really help men by having the government tax them to do for them what they can and should do for themselves.
From The Ten Cannots by William J. H. Boetcker
Be thankful we're not getting all the government we're paying for.
Will Rogers
There's a bad side to the very convenience of law. It deadens
the conscience of individuals by relieving them of the ethical
responsibility of their own actions.
George Bernard Shaw
I feel this way about it. World trade means world peace and consequently the World Trade Center buildings in New York ... had a bigger purpose than just to provide room for tenants. The World Trade Center is a living symbol of man's dedication to world peace ... beyond the compelling need to make this a monument to world peace, the World Trade Center should, because of its importance, become a representation of man's belief in humanity, his need for individual dignity, his beliefs in the cooperation of men, and through cooperation, his ability to find greatness.
Minoru Yamasaki, World Trade Center architect
Team Twin Towers
Camels bite and goats butt. I guess both would be better than a socialist President.
Fran Webb