"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we now know that it is bad economics."

"True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made."

"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics"

"But while they prate of economic laws, men and women are starving. We must lay hold of the fact that economic laws are not made by nature. They are made by human beings."

"An election cannot give a country a firm sense of direction if it has two or more national parties which merely have different names, but are as alike in their principals and aims as two peas in the same pod."

"Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country."

"A nation that destroys it's soils destroys itself. Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people."

"Are you laboring under the impression that I read these memoranda of yours? I can't even lift them."

"To reach a port, we must sail - sail, not tie at anchor - sail, not drift."

"Favor comes because for a brief moment in the great space of human change and progress some general human purpose finds in him a satisfactory embodiment."

"Physical strength can never permanently withstand the impact of spiritual force."

"I think we consider too much the good luck of the early bird and not enough the bad luck of the early worm."

"Here is my principle: Taxes shall be levied according to ability to pay. That is the only American principle."

"The virtues are lost in self-interest as rivers are lost in the sea."

"If we can ''boondoggle'' ourselves out of this depression, that word is going to be enshrined in the hearts of the American people for years to come."

"We shall make the most lasting progress if we recognize that Social Security can furnish only a base upon which each one of our citizens may build his individual security through his own individual efforts."

"Today we are faced with the preeminent fact that, if civilization is to survive, we must cultivate the science of human relationships... the ability of all peoples, of all kinds, to live together, in the same world, at peace."

"The test of our progress is not whether we add to the abundance of those who have much. It is whether we provide enough to those who have little."

"Repetition does not transform a lie into a truth"

"Don't Risk It, Fix It."

"Taxes, are the dues that we pay for the privileges of membership in an organized society."

"There is no indispensable man."

"In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression--everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way--everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from want--which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants--everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear--which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression gainst any neighbor--anywhere in the world."

"I know you think you understand what you thought I said but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant"

"People don't realize that we cannot forecast the future. What we can do is have probabilities of what causes what, but that's as far as we go. And I've had a very successful career as a forecaster, starting in 1948 forward. The number of mistakes I have made are just awesome. There is no number large enough to account for that."

"Finance is wholly different from the rest the economy."

"I don't know where the stock market is going, but I will say this, that if it continues higher, this will do more to stimulate the economy than anything we've been talking about today or anything anybody else was talking about."

"Any informed borrower is simply less vulnerable to fraud and abuse."

"I'm a free-market economist from years and years back, and I've never veered from that."

"Increased jobs are the consequence of increased trade. Increasing jobs more than output implies a fall in productivity and standards of living. That surely cannot be our goal."

"If somebody had said to me in June or July of 1987, 'We'd like you to become chairman of the Federal Reserve, but you're never allowed to discuss any economics after you leave,' I'd have said, 'Forget it.' What do they want me to do? Become an anthropologist?'"

"Crony capitalism is essentially a condition in which... public officials are giving favours to people in the private sector in payment of political favours."

"Fear and euphoria are dominant forces, and fear is many multiples the size of euphoria. Bubbles go up very slowly as euphoria builds. Then fear hits, and it comes down very sharply. When I started to look at that, I was sort of intellectually shocked. Contagion is the critical phenomenon which causes the thing to fall apart."

"The person I liked the best was Gerald R. Ford. He was the most decent man in politics I ever had any relationships with."

"An almost hysterical antagonism toward the gold standard is one issue which unites statists of all persuasions. They seem to sense... that gold and economic freedom are inseparable."

"Chinese productivity is the highest in the world but the way they do it is by borrowing the technology from abroad, either by joint ventures or other means."

"Chinese productivity is the highest in the world but the way they do it is by borrowing the technology from abroad, either by joint ventures or other means."

"I always believed in animal spirits. It's not their existence that is new. It's the fact that they are not random events, but actually replicate in-bred qualities of human nature which create those animal spirits."

"To succeed, you will soon learn, as I did, the importance of a solid foundation in the basics of education - literacy, both verbal and numerical, and communication skills."

"Every economy exists, no matter what the level of democracy, has elements of crony capitalism. It's - given human nature and given the democratic structures, which we all, I assume, adhere to, that is an inevitable consequence."

"Unless you are willing to compromise, society cannot live together."

"I get so engaged when I have a problem you cannot solve that I just cannot break away from what I am doing - I keep thinking and thinking and cannot stop."

"The only way you get economic progress, real standards of living moving higher, is to have the savings of the society continuously invested in the cutting-edge technologies. And those technologies which are obsolescent get dropped out."

"One of the problems with hedge funds is that they are changing so rapidly. If you have the balance sheet that closed business last night, by 11 A.M. this morning, that won't tell you very much about what they're doing."

"In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation. There is no safe store of value."

"We really can't forecast all that well, and yet we pretend that we can, but we really can't."

"Corruption, embezzlement, fraud, these are all characteristics which exist everywhere. It is regrettably the way human nature functions, whether we like it or not. What successful economies do is keep it to a minimum. No one has ever eliminated any of that stuff."

"I do not understand where the backing of Bitcoin is coming from. There is no fundamental issue of capabilities of repaying it in anything which is universally acceptable, which is either intrinsic value of the currency or the credit or trust of the individual who is issuing the money, whether it's a government or an individual."

"Whatever you tax, you get less of."

"I have found no greater satisfaction than achieving success through honest dealing and strict adherence to the view that, for you to gain, those you deal with should gain as well."