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John Kenneth Galbraith Quotes - Page 11

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I've been writing a book called The Economics of Innocent Fraud. I published part of it already in The Progressive (Free Market Fraud, January 1999). But I've been interrupted these last few months. It deals with all of

I've been writing a book called The Economics of Innocent Fraud. I published part of it already in The Progressive ("Free Market Fraud," January 1999). But I've been interrupted these last few months. It deals with all of the things we do, in an innocent way, to cover up the truth.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Book, Writing, Way
Source: progressive.org

The miserable consumption of the poor is partly the result of the ostentatious demands of the rich. There isn't enough for both, and the latter get far more than they need...But could anything seriously be done about it?

John Kenneth Galbraith
Needs, Done, Demand

I think the role of the Federal Reserve is enormously exaggerated.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Thinking, Roles, Federal Reserve
Source: www.progressive.org

But it can be laid down as a rule that those who speak most of liberty are least inclined to use it.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Liberty, Use, Speak
John Kenneth Galbraith (2015). “The New Industrial State”, p.485, Princeton University Press

The more underdeveloped the country, the more overdeveloped the women.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Country, Women, Men Women
John Kenneth Galbraith (1969). “Ambassador's Journal”

Humor is richly rewarding to the person who employs it. It has some value in gaining and holding attention, but it has no persuasive value at all.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Humor, Attention, Economy

Any consideration of the life and larger social existence of the modern corporate man begins and also largely ends with the effect of one all-embracing force. That is organization - the highly structured assemblage of men, and now some women, of which he is a part. It is to this, at the expense of family, friends, sex, recreation and sometimes health and effective control of alcoholic intake, that he is expected to devote his energies.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Sex, Men, Organization
"Corporate Man". The New York Times, January 22, 1984.

The drive toward complex technical achievement offers a clue to why the U.S. is good at space gadgetry and bad at slum problems.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Technology, Space, Achievement
The Saturday Evening Post, 1968.

Only men of considerable vanity write books; consistently therewith, I worried lest the world were exchanging an irreplaceable author for a more easily purchased diplomat.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Book, Writing, Men
"The New Industrial State". Foreword to the book by John Kenneth Galbraith, p. 7, 1967.

No hungry man who is also sober can be persuaded to use his last dollar for anything but food.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Men, Dollars, Use
John Kenneth Galbraith (2015). “The New Industrial State”, p.6, Princeton University Press

Agreeable as it is to know where one is proceeding, it is far more important to know where one has arrived.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Important, Knows, Proceeding
John Kenneth Galbraith (2015). “The New Industrial State”, p.393, Princeton University Press

The overall effect of the rise of the industrial system is greatly to reduce the union as a social force. But it will not disappear or become entirely unimportant.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Unions, Disappear, Social
John Kenneth Galbraith (2015). “The New Industrial State”, p.338, Princeton University Press

If inheritance qualifies one for office, intelligence cannot be a requirement.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Office, Inheritance, Requirements
"The Age of Uncertainty". Book by John Kenneth Galbraith. Chapter 5, p. 137, 1977.

The present age of contentment will come to an end only when and if the adverse developments that it fosters challenge the sense of comfortable well-being

John Kenneth Galbraith
Challenges, Age, Contentment
John Kenneth Galbraith (2017). “The Culture of Contentment”, p.122, Princeton University Press

Any country that has Milton Friedman as an adviser has nothing to fear from a few million Arabs.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Country, Milton, Adviser
"The Private Man and the Public Life; Interview With Galbraith". The Washington Post, April 26, 1981.

I never enjoyed writing a book more; indeed, it is the only one I remember in no sense as a labor but as a joy.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Book, Writing, Joy
John Kenneth Galbraith (1980). “The Great Crash 1929”

SOME YEARS, like some poets,and politicians and some lovely women, are singled out for fame far beyond the common lot, and 1929 was clearly such a year.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Years, Lovely, Common
JOHN KENNETH GALBRAITH (1962). “THE GREAT CRASH 1929”

We do not manufacture wants for goods we do not produce.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Want, Produce, Goods
John Kenneth Galbraith (1998). “The Affluent Society”, p.113, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

No one was responsible for the great Wall Street crash. No one engineered the speculation that preceded it. Both were the product of free choice and decision of hundreds of thousands of individuals.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Wall, Decision, Choices
John Kenneth Galbraith (1955). “The great crash, 1929”

In the early days of the crash it was widely believed that Jesse L. Livermore, a Bostonian with a large and unquestionably exaggerated reputation for bear operations, leading a syndicate that was driving the market down.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Bears, Reputation, Driving
"The Great Crash, 1929". Book by John Kenneth Galbraith. Chapter VIII, "Aftermath I," Section III, p. 141, 1954.

Money differs from an automobile or mistress in being equally important to those who have it and those who do not.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Money, Mistress, Important

One of the little-celebrated powers of Presidents (and other high government officials) is to listen to their critics with just enough sympathy to ensure their silence.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Sympathy, Government, Silence
John Kenneth Galbraith (1981). “A life in our times: memoirs”, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Emancipation of belief is the most formidable of the tasks of reform and the one on which all else depends.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Believe, Reform, Tasks

Monetary policy suffers from the unfortunate absence of any occult effect. It has long been clear that economic management...would be greatly facilitated if resort could occasionally be had to witchcraft.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Long, Suffering, Would Be

By all but the pathologically romantic, it is now recognized that this is not the age of the small man.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Birthday, Men, Age
John Kenneth Galbraith (2015). “The New Industrial State”, p.39, Princeton University Press

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