SOME FAMOUS THOUGHTS ABOUT ECONOMICS

Since the world economy is apparently about to go to heck in a hand basket, I thought it might be useful to let the experts weigh in on the subject:

1. "Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice."

Adam Smith

2. "There is one rule for the industrialist and that is: make the best quality goods possible at the lowest cost possible, paying the highest wages possible."

Henry Ford

3. "We know that advanced economies with stable governments that borrow in their own currency are capable of running up very high levels of debt without crisis."

Paul Krugman

4. "Surplus wealth is a sacred trust which its possessor is bound to administer in his lifetime for the good of the community."

Andrew Carnegie

5. "The production of too many useful things results in too many useless people."

Karl Marx

6. "No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money."

Jesus of Nazareth

7. "We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases, while the citizens may act only by permission."

Ayn Rand

8. "Prison inmates are treated to cable TV, hot meals and a college education, while on the outside some people can only afford these things through a life of crime."

Alfred E. Neuman

9. "A national debt, if it is not excessive, will be to us a national blessing."

Alexander Hamilton

10. "The inscrutability [of economics] is perhaps not unintentional.  It gives endless employment to dialecticians who otherwise might become public charges or, at very worst, swindlers and tricksters."

Jack Vance