Quotes from William E. Simon

If you would not confront your neighbor and demand his money at the point of a gun to solve every new problem that may appear in your life, you should not allow the government to do it for you.

Freedom is strangely ephemeral. It is something like breathing; one only becomes acutely aware of its importance when one is choking.

I continue to believe that the American people have a love-hate relationship with inflation. They hate inflation but love everything that causes it.

Bad politicians are sent to Washington by good people who don't vote.

Bad politicians are sent to Washington by good people who don't vote.

If you really want to help the poor, help the rich. They're the ones who will invest, build more factories, create more jobs.

I continue to believe that the American people have a love-hate relationship with inflation. They hate inflation but love everything that causes it.

I sometimes think that the only person fit to inherit wealth is the person who doesn't need an inheritance - the person who would create his own fortune no matter what his start in life - and have come to view inherited wealth as an affliction.

Productivity and the growth of productivity must be the first economic consideration at all times, not the last. That is the source of technological innovation, jobs, and wealth.

Disagreement on issues doesn't mean 'dissension.' All it means is that honest men can differ in their approach. You lay out your positions, and president makes a decision.

The nation should have a tax system that looks like someone designed it on purpose.

Work appealed to me; school did not. I was a disinterested, bored student.

Pop taught me respect for my fellow man and reverence for my God. He taught me the importance of family and religion.

For the U.S., the primary interest is our continued access to Saudi Arabian oil in adequate quantities... at an acceptable political as well as economic price.

While Pop lived his life in comfort, he was always generous to the less fortunate.

At Union Securities, I threw myself into my work with the discipline and commitment that I had always demonstrated in employment and only rarely displayed in school. Years later, I would come to appreciate, abstractly, the importance of productive activity to the mind and soul of both an individual and a nation.

By the mid-1950s, the young bond traders on the Street were becoming more and more of a fraternity. We organized informal luncheons every Thursday in an effort to educate financial writers, who knew next to nothing about municipal bonds.

I found that I not only tolerated taking risks, I loved it.

Infinitely more important than sharing one's material wealth is sharing the wealth of ourselves-our time and energy, our passion and commitment, and, above all, our love.

Freedom is strangely ephemeral. It is something like breathing; one only becomes acutely aware of its importance when one is choking.

Writing checks for charities is necessary and important. But it can't compare with corporal works of mercy, which are infinitely greater.

Trading demands total concentration and the ability to do several things at once while instantly recalling trading prices from the day, or week, before.

My father's card-playing buddies treated me as a plain, ordinary, commonplace kid destined for mediocrity - or less. I suppose they expected that I would spend my life as a clerk of some sort.

The American citizen must be made aware that today a relatively small group of people is proclaiming its purposes to be the will of the People. That elitist approach to government must be repudiated.