Quotes About Policy

Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

In the late 1990s, when President Bill Clinton said he intended to "end welfare as we know it," he proposed an increase in the Job Corps budget. So a program that had been a total failure for three decades, with very little to show for the billions it had squandered, was to be rewarded with a bigger budget.

The dollar has lost over 95 percent of its value since the Fed was created.

we should abolish the Fed altogether, since in the view of these economists it is entirely superfluous to a market economy.

The whole system is overseen by the government-created Federal Reserve System, which presides over a system-wide cartel.

I am getting more and more convinced that the war-peace question is the key to the whole libertarian business," Rothbard noted privately in 1956. I am equally convinced. If we can't get this right, who cares about the Department of Education or the minimum wage?

In the middle of the porch was a vertical sun-dial, whose gnomon swayed loosely about when the wind blew, and cast its shadow hither and thither, as much as to say, 'Here's your fine model dial; here's any time for any man; I am an old dial; and shiftiness is the best policy.

Peace and friendship with all mankind is our wisest policy, and I wish we may be permitted to pursue it.

The policy of the American government is to leave its citizens free, neither restraining them nor aiding them in their pursuits.

That government which governs best, governs least.

The opinions of men are not the object of civil government, nor under its jurisdiction.

My general plan would be to make the states one as to every thing connected with foreign nations, and several as to every thing purely domestic. But with all the imperfections of our present government, it is without comparison the best existing or that ever did exist.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes.

The policy are to be commended.' Aschenbach replied, and after a brief exchange of meteorological observations the manager excused himself.

Weapons and food have been firmly linked in the governmental mind for as long as either has been around.

Weighing benefits against costs is the way most people make decisions — and the way most businesses make decisions, if they want to stay in business. Only in government is any benefit, however small, considered to be worth any cost, however large.

However much history may be invoked in support of these policies (affirmative action), no policy can apply to history but can only apply to the present or the future. The past may be many things, but it is clearly irrevocable. Its sins can no more be purged than its achievements can be expunged. Those who suffered in centuries past are as much beyond our help as those who sinned are beyond our retribution.

Where recyling takes place only in response to political pressures and exhortations, it need not meet the test of being incrementally worth its incremental costs. Accordingly, studies of government-imposed recycling programs in the United States have shown that what they salvage is usually worth less than the cost of salvaging it.

People who want special taxes or subsidies for particular things seem not to understand that what they are really asking for is for the prices to misstate the relative scarcities of things and the relative values that the users of these things put on them. One

The difference is that one system involves each individual making choices for himself or herself, while the other system involves a small number of people making choices for millions of others.

In short, rent control reduces the rate of housing turnover.

Free-loading at emergency rooms—mandated by government—makes being uninsured a viable option.

While those with the vision of the anointed emphasize the knowledge and resources available to promote the various policy programs they favor, those with the tragic vision of the human condition emphasize that these resources are taken from other uses ("there is no free lunch") and that the knowledge and wisdom required to run ambitious social programs far exceed what any human being has ever possessed, as the unintended negative consequences of such programs repeatedly demonstrate.

All that the government can do in reality is change the tax rate. How much tax revenue that will produce depends on how people react.