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Every government interference in the economy consists of giving an unearned benefit, extorted by force, to some men at the expense of others.

Ayn Rand

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Ayn Rand
Age: 77 †
Born: 1905
Born: February 2
Died: 1982
Died: March 6
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Philosopher
Playwright
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
St. Petersburg
Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum
Every
Liberty
Unearned
Men
Economy
Interference
Economic
Expense
Politics
Expenses
Force
Consists
Others
Benefit
Government
Benefits
Giving
Humor

More quotes by Ayn Rand

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A viler evil than to murder a man, is to sell him suicide as an act of virtue.
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Let us destroy, but don't let us pretend that we are commiting an act of virtue.
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The purpose of morality is to teach you, not to suffer and die, but to enjoy yourself and live.
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Men prosper or fail, survive or perish in proportion to the degree of their rationality.
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Collectivism requires self-sacrifice, the subordination of one's interests to those of others.
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I don't like people who speak or think in terms of gaining anybody's confidence. If one's actions are honest, one does not need the predated confidence of others, only their rational perception. The person who craves a moral blank check of that kind, has dishonest intentions, whether he admits it to himself or not.
Ayn Rand
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Gold was an objective value, an equivalent of wealth produced. Paper is a mortgage on wealth that does not exist, backed by a gun aimed at those who are expected to produce it.
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To demand 'sense' is the hallmark of nonsense. Nature does not make sense. Nothing makes sense.
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In this world, either you're virtuous or you enjoy yourself. Not both, lady, not both.
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We the Living is not a novel 'about Soviet Russia.' It is a novel about Man against the State. Its basic theme is the sanctity of human life - using the word 'sanctity' not in a mystical sense, but in the sense of 'supreme value.'
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It was the joy of admiration and of one's own ability, growing together.
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I swear, by my life and my love of it, that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine.
Ayn Rand
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Thousands of years ago the first man discovered how to make fire. He was probably burnt at the stake he'd taught his brothers to light, but he left them a gift they had not conceived and he lifted darkness from the face of the Earth.
Ayn Rand
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Face a challenge and find joy in the capacity to meet it.
Ayn Rand
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Poverty is not a mortgage on the labor of others-misfortu ne is not a mortgage on achievement-fai lure is not a mortgage on success-sufferi ng is not a claim check, and its relief is not the goal of existence-man is not a sacrificial animal on anyone’s altar nor for anyone’s cause-life is not one huge hospital.
Ayn Rand
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A culture is not the anonymous product of undifferentiate d masses, but the sum of the intellectual achievements of individual men.
Ayn Rand
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Men have been taught that it is a virtue to stand together. But the creator is the man who stands alone.
Ayn Rand
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Volumes can be and have been written about the issue of freedom versus dictatorship, but, in essence, it comes down to a single question: do you consider it moral to treat men as sacrificial animals and to rule them by physical force?
Ayn Rand
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The social system based on and consonant with the altruist morality-with the code of self-sacrifice- is socialism, in all or any of its variants: fascism, Nazism, communism. All of them treat man as a sacrificial animal to be immolated for the benefit of the group, the tribe, the society, the state.
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You're not sorry. You could've been here if you made the effort. But when did you ever make an effort for anybody but yourself? You're not interested in any of us or in anything we do. You think if you pay the bills, that's enough, don't you? Money! That's all you know. And all you give us is money. Have you even given us any time?
Ayn Rand