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There is no such thing as a normal period of history. Normality is a fiction of economic textbooks.

Joan Robinson

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Joan Robinson
Age: 79 †
Born: 1903
Born: October 31
Died: 1983
Died: August 5
Economist
University Teacher
Camberley
Surrey
Joan Violet Robinson
Joan Violet Maurice
Economic
History
Thing
Normality
Textbooks
Period
Periods
Normal
Fiction

More quotes by Joan Robinson

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It is much easier to organize control over one industry serving many markets than over one market served by the products of several industries.
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Capital' is not what capital is called, it is what its name is called.
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The purpose of studying economics is not to acquire a set of ready-made answers to economic questions, but to learn how to avoid being deceived by economists.
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I came away from the talk with the perception that the risk of adverse side effects is so much greater than the risk of cervical cancer, I couldn’t help but question why we need the vaccine at all.
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I do not regard the Keynesian revolution as a great intellectual triumph. On the contrary, it was a tragedy because it came so late. Hitler had already found out how to cure unemployment before Keynes had finished explaining why it occured.
Joan Robinson
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Economic theorists should not make such a production about taking a rabbit out of a hat after having put the rabbit into the hat in full view of the audience.
Joan Robinson
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The orthodox doctrines of economics which were dominant in the last quarter of the nineteenth century had a clear message. They supported laisser faire, free trade, the gold standard, and the universally advantageous effects of the pursuit of profit by competitive private enterprise.
Joan Robinson
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The very nature of economics is rooted in nationalism. ... It [was] developed ... in the hope of throwing light upon questions of policy. But policy means nothing unless there is an authority to carry it out, and authorities are national.
Joan Robinson
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owning capital is not a productive activity.
Joan Robinson
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It's a terrible thing to be a worker exploited in the capitalist system. The only worse thing is to be a worker unable to find anyone to exploit you.
Joan Robinson
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The point of studying economics is so as not to be fooled by economists.
Joan Robinson
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Unemployment is a reproach to a democratic government.
Joan Robinson
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The first essential for economists ... is to ... combat, not foster, the ideology which pretends that values which can be measured in terms of money are the only ones that ought to count.
Joan Robinson
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Ideology is like breath: you never smell your own.
Joan Robinson
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Unequal distribution of income is an excessively uneconomic method of getting the necessary saving done.
Joan Robinson
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In all the talk in the Principles (as opposed to the formal analysis) it is not the saving of rentiers but the energy of entrepreneurs which governs accumulation.
Joan Robinson
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Marxism is the opium of the Marxists.
Joan Robinson
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If a rise in wages does not raise prices, a fall will not reduce them.
Joan Robinson
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Even if the crises that are looming up are overcome and a new run of prosperity lies ahead, deeper problems will still remain. Modern capitalism has no purpose except to keep the show going.
Joan Robinson
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When I came up to Cambridge (in October 1921) to read economics, I did not have much idea of what it was about.
Joan Robinson