Quotes from Joseph E. Stiglitz

the six heirs to the Wal-Mart empire command wealth of $69.7 billion, which is equivalent to the wealth of the entire bottom 30 percent of U.S. society.

the newly elected government was told in effect that they had no choice: accept the conditions or your banking system will be destroyed, your economy will be devastated, and you will have to leave the euro. What does it mean to be a democracy, where the citizens seemingly have no say over the issues about which they care the most, or the way their economy is run?

Those at the top have managed to design a tax system in which they pay less than their fair share—they pay a lower fraction of their income than do those who are much poorer.

recent research has shown that by far the largest fraction of personal bankruptcies involve the illness of a family member.38

While GDP is the standard measure of economic performance,2 there are other indicators, and in virtually every one, the eurozone's overall performance is dismal, and that of the crisis countries, disastrous: unemployment is very high; youth unemployment is very, very high; and output per capita is lower than before the crisis for the eurozone as a whole, much lower for some of the crisis countries.

Capitalist economies have thus always involved a blend of private markets and government—the question is not markets or government, but how to combine the two to best advantage.

La globalización actual no funciona. Para muchos de los pobres de la Tierra no está funcionando. Para buena parte del medio ambiente no funciona. Para la estabilidad de la economía global no funciona

Existe una gran controversia sobre si los bancos centrales deben ser más independientes o no. Alguna evidencia indica que las tasas de inflación pueden ser menores, pero hay poca evidencia de que mejoran las variables reales como el crecimiento o el paro. No pretendo resolver aquí esta polémica sino subrayar que, dada la controversia, no se debe imponer a un país una visión particular

Looking back at that belief during hearings this fall on Capitol Hill, Alan Greenspan said out loud, "I have found a flaw." Congressman Henry Waxman pushed him, responding, "In other words, you found that your view of the world, your ideology, was not right; it wasn't working." "Absolutely, precisely," Greenspan said.

We are now approaching the level of inequality that marks dysfunctional societies—it is a club that we would distinctly not want to join, including Iran, Jamaica, Uganda, and the Philippines.93

la guerra moderna de alta tecnología está diseñada para suprimir el contacto físico: arrojar bombas desde 50.000 pies logra que uno no «sienta» lo que hace, la administración económica moderna es similar, desde un hotel de lujo, uno puede forzar insensiblemente políticas sobre las cuales uno pensaría dos veces si conociera a las personas cuya vida va a destruir

En los problemas del FMI y las demás instituciones económicas internacionales subyace un problema de Gobierno: quién decide qué hacen. Las instituciones están dominadas no sólo por los países industrializados más ricos sino también por los intereses comerciales y financieros de esos países, lo que naturalmente se refleja en las políticas de dichas entidades

looking out for the other guy isn't just good for the soul; it's good for business. The

But Dutch and other European milk producers would like to increase sales by having their milk, transported over long distances, appear to be as fresh as the local product. In 2014 the Troika forced Greece to drop the label "fresh" on its truly fresh milk and extend allowable shelf life.

In a world of globalization, creating market value had become entirely separated from creating employment. There was no reason to believe that giving more money to America's wealthy would lead to more investment in the United States:

The true sources of wealth are the productivity, creativity, and vitality of our people; the advances of science and technology that have been so marked over the past two and a half centuries; and the advances in economic, political, and social organization that have occurred over the same period, including the rule of law, competitive, well-regulated markets, and democratic institutions with checks, balances, and a broad range of "truth-telling" institutions.

The true wealth of a nation is measured by its capacity to deliver, in a sustainable way, high standards of living for all of its citizens.

there is always a worry that voters will be attracted to populists and extremists who attack the establishment that has created this unfair system21 and who make unrealistic promises of change. Distrust

The more divided a society becomes in terms of wealth, the more reluctant the wealthy are to spend money on common needs. The rich don't need to rely on government for parks or education or medical care or personal security. They can buy all these things for themselves. In the process, they become more distant from ordinary people.

The most important "endowment," from our perspective, is a society's learning capacities (which in turn is affected by the knowledge that it has; its knowledge about learning itself; and its knowledge about its own learning capacities)

Already, data showed that the American dream of rags to riches, the Horatio Alger story, was largely a myth. Economic mobility was extremely limited. The abolition of the estate tax could solidify these changes, creating a new "class" society, based not on ancient nobility as in Europe, but on the bonanza of the Roaring Nineties. The

If the efficient-markets hypothesis were true, it would ironically mean that stock markets would necessarily be very inefficient, since no one would gather any information.36 In the aftermath of the Great Recession, the efficient-markets model has taken a beating.37 In the meanwhile, though, some market advocates continue to use the "price discovery" argument for defending changes in markets that were actually making it more volatile and less efficient.

For now, we simply note that the marked reduction in inequality in the period between 1950 and 1970, was due partly to developments in the markets but even more to government policies, such as the increased access to higher education provided by the GI Bill and the highly progressive tax system enacted during World War II.

there are two ways to become wealthy: to create wealth or to take wealth away from others.