Michael Bloomberg Quotes - Page 3

Design does matter. And not necessarily in a way that people realize. A lot of what you do, people take for granted - that a park has always been here, that a bicycle lane has always been there, that the street is safe or clean.

The truth of the matter is: you can create a great legacy, and inspire others, by giving it to philanthropic organizations.

You can't depend on polls.

I don't know why people carry guns. Guns kill people.

You have to take away some of tax breaks for the wealthy, and you have to cut back on some entitlements. Because, unless we do all of these things, it just doesn't work. And what's good theater and what's good politics isn't necessarily good economic policy.

America is built around this premise that you can do it, and there are an awful lot of people who are unlikely to have done it who did.

Stubborn isn't a word I would use to describe myself; pigheaded is more appropriate.

I thought Jeb Bush would have made a good president. He was on the board of my foundation. He's very conservative, much too conservative for me.

Now, you might say – “But why should we pay people for doing what they’re supposed to do?” It’s a fair question – but think of it this way: Every other anti-poverty program that’s been tried has failed to get the national poverty rate below 11 percent... Why shouldn’t we experiment with a program built around the one strategy that has proven time and again to work wonders – capitalism?

Nobody should ever mistake and think that our country [USA] is weakened, or that authority is diffuse and unspecified, and that we are vulnerable.

Even though New York is the safest big city in the nation, there are still far too many illegal guns on our streets. Nearly all of them arrive from out of state - and most are sold by a small group of rogue gun dealers who refuse to obey federal laws.

If you think of all the publicity about the terrible tragedy of Virginia Tech, we have a Virginia Tech in this country every day. It's just spread across 50 states.

In our democracy, near equality is no equality. Government either treats everyone the same, or it doesn't. And right now it doesn't.

And I think the more money you put in people's hands, the more they will spend. And if they don't spend it, they invest it. And investing it is another way of creating jobs. It puts money into mutual funds or other kinds of banks that can go out and make loans, and we need to do that.

If you look at who starts new businesses, people that are innovative and risk takers. When you look at immigrants, you really have to be an innovator and a risk taker to leave everything you know in the old country and go to a new country. People that come here in America come here to work.

Despite its potential, the federal government has restricted funding for creating new cell lines - putting the burden of any future research squarely on the shoulders of the private sector. Government's most basic responsibility, however, is the health and welfare of its people, so it has a duty to encourage appropriate scientific investigations that could possibly save the lives of millions.

And I keep saying, whether you like the president or not, everybody has to pull together and help the president because, as the president goes, so goes the country, as the country goes, so goes your job, your ability to feed your family, your government.

Most people won't have opportunity to do full-time service, but those lucky enough to have monetary wealth or some spare time really can make an enormous difference. As someone who's now in the public sector, and is seeing up-close-and-personal the real impact of what we do and what we give, I can tell you: every dollar and every volunteer help, in more ways than you can count.

We have always had, remember, small groups of both parties that split off. There were the "blue dog Democrats." There were the "Dixie Democrats." Democrats were never going to, ever again, pull together.

I've always thought if we don't want to enforce laws on the books, we should remove them from the books. But when you have laws, you breed contempt if you don't enforce them.

Keep in mind, Mike Bloomberg's kids and grandkids are breathing that air just like the coalminers' families are breathing that air. And the coalminers are the ones that have the conflict. They want their jobs, I understand that. They need to be able to feed their families. They also have to worry about their health and the health of their families.

I do not think that anybody should get paid for lousy performance. I've said that for a long time. If you work hard and you do good, you get paid well.

Trees will improve property values, take pollutants out of the air, help with water runoff.

This is the city of dreamers and time and again it's the place where the greatest dream of all, the American dream, has been tested and has triumphed.

The main claim to fame, I think, of Bernie Sanders - who I've never met; I'm sure he's a pleasant guy - [is that] he's certainly not stupid.