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First word [of my father] when I arrived [as a CEO] is, 'Son, i hope your first deal is a loser, otherwise, you'll think you're a lot smarter than you are.' But he had tremendous values, tremendous integrity, humility, work ethic and terrific thirst for knowledge.

Charles Koch

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Charles Koch
Age: 89
Born: 1935
Born: November 1
Businessman
Businessperson
Wichita
Kansas
Charles G. Koch
Charles de Ganahl Koch
First
Deal
Loser
Work
Deals
Smarter
Think
Word
Tremendous
Thinking
Knowledge
Ethics
Ethic
Values
Otherwise
Ceo
Hope
Integrity
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Father
Humility
Terrific
Firsts
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Thirst

More quotes by Charles Koch

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If we are going to have a Fed, it should not fall into the tyranny of experts with the a fatal conceit that a few wise people can determine interest rates. Interest rates should be driven by the market, and people's time preference, and we see these boom-bust cycles.
Charles Koch
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If somebody is doing more and more to make other people's lives better, have them make all they can, if that's what drives them, because that's what we want.
Charles Koch
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If you never failed, then you're probably not doing very much.
Charles Koch
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Far too many businesses have been all too eager to lobby for maintaining and increasing subsidies and mandates paid by taxpayers and consumers. This growing partnership between business and government is a destructive force, undermining not just our economy and our political system, but the very foundations of culture.
Charles Koch
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I've been blessed by learning certain principles and values that transformed my life and enabled me to accomplish more than I really had the ability to do or ever dream possible. And so I decided that I wanted to give as many other people as possible the opportunity to learn these ideas and transform their lives as I had.
Charles Koch
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How do we make people's lives better unless we find the truth of what works and what doesn't?
Charles Koch
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Innovation comes from recombining existing technology and different perspectives in innovative ways.
Charles Koch
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Many businesses with unpopular products or inefficient production find it much easier to curry the favor of a few influential politicians or a government agency than to compete in the open market.
Charles Koch
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We try to evaluate how much value an employee is creating here and reward them accordingly.
Charles Koch
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You can pay certain people more money and stuff but that's just going to be a transfer from one group to another. The only way people's wages are going to rise overall, or average median income is going to rise, is if you increase productivity.
Charles Koch
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I get a lot of death threats. But the way I look at it, I feel I have a moral obligation to do the best I can to make the country better for everybody, and that threatens certain people because they're going to have much less power. I want the power to go back to people making decisions over their own lives rather than some experts making it.
Charles Koch
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I don't have all the answers. I have a lot of questions. And I have some basic principles.
Charles Koch
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I'd like to see a rebirth of America - go back where there's equal rights for everybody and that people succeed to the extent that they help other people improve their lives. To lead toward a society that maximizes peace, civility, and well-being for everyone.
Charles Koch
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The easy way to make money is to get special political privilege. From the beginning of time, business has cozied up to government and gotten restrictions on competition and subsidies and stuff.
Charles Koch
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Just keep trying things, without really understanding the underlying fibers of well-being, or peace or civility, then you're just going to stumble from one disaster to another.
Charles Koch
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The good and the bad news is that politicians rarely do what they say they are going to do when they campaign.
Charles Koch
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To be happy you have to fulfill your nature. That's what Aristotle taught so many centuries ago, that the road to happiness isn't to go drink more or consume more. The road to happiness is to fully develop your abilities, and then apply them to do good.
Charles Koch
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I have been a libertarian in my past but now I consider myself a classical liberal.
Charles Koch
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Just Donald Trump's tenor and insulting of people is just beyond the pale.
Charles Koch
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I've had the philosophy that John Adams expressed, in the kind of system that we're trying to create in this country: that this is a system for moral people. It will work for no other.
Charles Koch