"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."

"I stated that I'm a libertarian Republican, which means I believe in a series of issues, such as smaller government, constraint on budget deficits, free markets, globalization, and a whole series of other things, including welfare reform."

"Most high-income people in our country do not realize that their incomes are being subsidized by their protection from competition from highly skilled people who are prevented from immigrating to the United States. But we need such skills in order to staff our productive economy, so that the standard of living for Americans as a whole can grow."

"Protectionism will do little to create jobs and if foreigners retaliate, we will surely lose jobs."

"There is a huge number of people outside our borders who would love to come here. In fact, many of them come here, get well educated, and then are required to leave... This is a factor in income inequality."

"Europe is very critical to the United States in the sense not only do we have a fourth of our exports there, but more importantly, a significant proportion of the foreign affiliate profits in fact, half of U.S. corporations, are in Europe."

"Before I met Ayn Rand, I was a logical positivist, and accordingly, I didn't believe in absolutes, moral or otherwise. If I couldn't prove a proposition with facts and figures, it was without merit."

"There are winners and there are losers. And as much as we would like to help the losers, if we do it in the way that directs the limited capital of the society to support the low-productivity parts of the economy, it means that the rest of the economy - our overall standard of living - will not rise as much as it could."

"There are winners and there are losers. And as much as we would like to help the losers, if we do it in the way that directs the limited capital of the society to support the low-productivity parts of the economy, it means that the rest of the economy - our overall standard of living - will not rise as much as it could."

"The very nature of finance is that it cannot be profitable unless it is significantly leveraged... and as long as there is debt, there can be failure and contagion."

"The true measure of a career is to be able to be content, even proud, that you succeeded through your own endeavors without leaving a trail of casualties in your wake."

"The United States can pay any debt it has because we can always print money to do that. So there is zero probability of default."

"When you go back and look at American history, it's not terribly different from Canadian history. If you weren't self-reliant on the prairie, you wouldn't survive."

"If I turn out to be particularly clear, you've probably misunderstood what I've said."

"Revolutions are something you see only in retrospect."

"Anything that we can do to raise personal savings is very much in the interest of this country."

"Look, I'm very much in favor of tax cuts, but not with borrowed money. And the problem that we've gotten into in recent years is spending programs with borrowed money, tax cuts with borrowed money, and at the end of the day that proves disastrous. And my view is I don't think we can play subtle policy here."

"Fear is a far more dominant force in human behaviour than euphoria - I would never have expected that or given it a moment's thought before, but it shows up in the data in so many ways."

"History has not dealt kindly with the aftermath of protracted periods of low risk premiums."

"I've been in and out of Wall Street since 1949, and I've never seen the type of animosity between government and Wall Street. And I'm not sure where it comes from, but I suspect it's got to do with a general schism in this society which is really becoming ever more destructive."

"There are errors in this book. I do not know where they are. If I did they wouldn't be there. But with close to two hundred thousand words my probabilistic mind tells me some are wrong."

"I'm not denying that monopolies are terrible things, but I am denying that it is readily easy to resolve them through legislation of that nature."

"Markets do very weird things because it reacts to how people behave, and sometimes people are a little screwy."

"I guess I should warn you, if I turn out to be particularly clear, you’ve probably misunderstood what I said."

"We're a democratic society. Shutting down the government should not be on the agenda."

"If I seem unduly clear to you, you must have misunderstood what I said. -- Speaking to a Senate Committee in 1987, as quoted in the Guardian Weekly, November 4, 2005."

"The only way to have several currencies from divergent nations lumped together is if they are culturally close, such as Germany, the Netherlands and Austria. If they aren't, it simply can't continue to work."

"We had a bubble in housing."

"Government regulation cannot substitute for individual integrity."

"Plans are nothing; planning is everything."

"There is no victory at bargain basement prices."

"Pull the string, and it will follow wherever you wish. Push it, and it will go nowhere at all."

"You do not lead by hitting people over the head -- that's assault, not leadership."

"Work should be for all of us a word as honorable and appealing as patriotism"

"I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it. (31 August 1959)"

"We have heard much of the phrase, ''peace and friendship.'' This phrase, in expressing the aspiration of America, is not complete. We should say instead, ''peace and friendship, in freedom.'' This, I think, is America's real message to the rest of the world."

"We seek peace, knowing that peace is the climate of freedom."

"I would rather try to persuade a man to go along, because once I have persuaded him, he will stick. If I scare him, he will stay just as long as he is scared, and then he is gone."

"In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable."

"The future of this republic is in the hands of the American voter."

"The clearest way to show what the rule of law means to us in everyday life is to recall what has happened when there is no rule of law."

"The best morale exist when you never hear the word mentioned. When you hear a lot of talk about it, it's usually lousy."

"Motivation is the art of getting people to do what you want them to do because they want to do it."

"Here and there, there are some people who are supremely endowed, ... My memory goes back to Jim Thorpe. He never practiced in his life, and he could do anything better than any other football player I ever saw."

"Our real problem, then, is not our strength today; it is rather the vital necessity of action today to ensure our strength tomorrow."

"You don't lead by hitting people over the head-that's assault, not leadership."

"Leadership is a word and a concept that has been more argued than almost any other I know. I am not one of the desk-pounding types that likes to stick out his jaw and look like he is bossing the show. I would far rather get behind and, recognizing the frailties and the requirements of human nature, would rather try to persuade a man to go along, because once I have persuaded him, he will stick. If I scare him, he will stay just as long as he is scared, and then he is gone."

"Dollars and guns are no substitutes for brains and will power"

"I have found out in later years that my family was very poor, but the glory of America is that we didn't know it. [On his childhood]"

"How has retirement affected my golf game? A lot more people beat me now."