“La mayoría nos formulamos la pregunta ¿Qué gano yo si lo hago? más habitual de lo que nos interrogamos si ¿Es lo que estoy haciendo moral o correcto en términos políticos? . […] en ninguna otra época como en la actual se han dejado de lado con tanta insistencia otras cuestiones, tanto en la vida pública como en la privada. No es que tomar decisiones pensando en el beneficio práctico sea reprobable en sí mismo o deba conducir a un daño moral irreparable; sin embargo, cuanto más subordinamos nuestras ideas y nuestro mundo interior a criterios económicos, más se reducen aquellos y más rápidamente se llega a la conclusión lógica de que ningún tipo de compromiso vale la pena, excepto el que sirve directa o indirectamente a nuestro propio interés; que las ideas sólo poseen cierto valor si pueden transformarse en moneda de cambio; que un proyecto sólo debe ser tenido en cuenta si arroja beneficios de algún tipo.”
“If the bringing of children into the world is today an economic burden, it is because the social system is inadequate; and not because God’s law is wrong. Therefore the State should remove the causes of that burden. The human must not be limited and controlled to fit the economic, but the economic must be expanded to fit the human.”
“To cut 1930s jobless, FDR taxed corps and rich. Govt used money to hire many millions. Worked then; would now again. Why no debate on that?”
“When we must pay the true price for the depletion of nature’s gifts, materials will become more precious to us, and economic logic will reinforce, and not contradict, our heart’s desire to treat the world with reverence and, when we receive nature’s gifts, to use them well.”
“Now, it’s true that some of the protesters are oddly dressed or have silly-sounding slogans, which is inevitable given the open character of the events. But so what? I, at least, am a lot more offended by the sight of exquisitely tailored plutocrats, who owe their continued wealth to government guarantees, whining that President Obama has said mean things about them than I am by the sight of ragtag young people denouncing consumerism.”
“The real problems of our planet are not economic or technical, they are philosophical. The philosophy of unbridled materialism is being challenged by events.”
“Economic development is something much wider and deeper than economics, let alone econometrics. Its roots lie outside the economic sphere, in education, organisation, discipline and, beyond that, in political independence and a national consciousness of self-reliance.”
“We must arm ourselves with patience and wisdom and listen to the poor what they want. This is the best way to avoid the trap of ignorance, ideology and inertia on our side.”
“In the lean approach, companies are taught that prices are set by the market and that one way to improve profit margin is to reduce costs. This thinking flies in the face of cost plus thinking, where we look first at our own costs and set prices based on our desired profit margin. The reality is that most companies whether manufacturers or hospitals, do not have market power to set prices as they wish.”
“Life is like a curve, horizontally or vertically, we are at origin point”
“The artificial primacy of defense among our national priorities is a constant unearned windfall for some, but it s privation for the rest of America; it steals from what we could be and can do. In Econ 101, they teach that the big-picture fight over national priorities is guns versus butter. Now it s butter versus margarine—guns get a pass. Overall, we re weaker for it, and at enormous cost.”
“(1) Use mathematics as shorthand language, rather than as an engine of inquiry. (2) Keep to them till you have done. (3) Translate into English. (4) Then illustrate by examples that are important in real life (5) Burn the mathematics. (6) If you can’t succeed in 4, burn 3. This I do often.”
“ECONOMICS IS HAUNTED by more fallacies than any other study known to man. This is no accident. The inherent difficulties of the subject would be great enough in any case, but they are multiplied a thousandfold by a factor that is insignificant in, say, physics, mathematics or medicine—the special pleading of selfish interests.”
“In neo-classical economic theory, it is claimed without evidence that people are basically self-seeking, that they want above all the satisfaction of their material desires: what economists call maximising utility . The ultimate objective of mankind is economic growth, and that is maximized only through raw, and lightly regulated, competition. If the rewards of this system are spread unevenly, that is a necessary price. Others on the planet are to be regarded as either customers, competitors or factors of production. Effects upon the planet itself are mere externalities to the model, with no reckoning of the cost - at least for now. Nowhere in this analysis appears factors such as human cooperation, love, trust, compassion or hatred, curiosity or beauty. Nowhere appears the concept of meaning. What cannot be measured is ignored. But the trouble is that once our basic needs for shelter and food have been met, these factors may be the most important of all.”
“If a theory of justice is to guide reasoned choice of policies, strategies or institutions, then the identification of fully just social arrangements is neither necessary nor sufficient.”
“[Economics] is all about observing the world with genuine curiosity and admitting that it is full of mysteries”
“Savings, remember, is the prerequisite of investment.”