Quote

The welfare state is not really about the welfare of the masses. It is about the egos of the elites.

Thomas Sowell

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Thomas Sowell
Age: 94
Born: 1930
Born: June 30
Economist
University Teacher
Gastonia
North Carolina
Ego
Welfare
Mass
Politics
State
States
Egos
Really
Elites
Masses

More quotes by Thomas Sowell

Image
You need only visit campuses where whole departments feature soft courses preaching a sense of victimhood and resentment, and see the consequences in racial and ethnic polarization on campus.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Civil rights used to be about treating everyone the same. But today some people are so used to special treatment that equal treatment is considered to be discrimination.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Economics is a study of cause-and-effect relationships in an economy. It's purpose is to discern the consequences of various ways of allocating resources which have alternative uses. It has nothing to say about philosophy or values, anymore than it has to say about music or literature.
Thomas Sowell
Image
If the battle for civilization comes down to the wimps versus the barbarians, the barbarians are going to win.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Those who want to spread the wealth almost invariably seek to concentrate the power. It happens too often, and in too many different countries around the world, to be a coincidence. Which is more dangerous, inequalities of wealth or concentrations of power?
Thomas Sowell
Image
Love is a four-letter word, but you don't hear in nearly as often as you hear some other four-letter words. It may be a sign of our times that everyone talks openly about sex, but we seem to be embarrassed to talk about love.
Thomas Sowell
Image
The great allure of government programs in general for many people is that these programs allow decisions to be made without having to worry about the constraints of prices, which confront people at every turn in a free market.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Competition does a much more effective job than government at protecting consumers.
Thomas Sowell
Image
To say that 'wealth in America is so unfairly distributed in America,' as Ronald Dworkin does, is grossly misleading when most wealth in the United States is not distributed: at all. People create it, earn it, save it, and spend it.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Most intellectuals outside the field of economics show remarkably little interest in learning even the basic fundamentals of economics. Yet they do not hesitate to make sweeping pronouncements about the economy in general, businesses in particular, and the many issues revolving around what is called 'income distribution'.
Thomas Sowell
Image
If you believe in equal rights, then what do “women’s rights,” “gay rights,” etc., mean? Either they are redundant or they are violations of the principle of equal rights for all.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Progress in general seems to hold little interest for people who call themselves 'progressives.' What arouses them are denunciations of social failures and accusations of wrong-doing.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Lunches don't get free just because you don't see the prices on the menu. And economists don't get popular by reminding people of that.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Even when black youth gangs target white strangers on the streets and spew out racial hatred as they batter them and rob them, mayors, police chiefs and the media tiptoe around their racism and many in the media either don't cover these stories or leave out the race and racism involved.
Thomas Sowell
Image
All justice is inherently social. Can someone on a desert island be either just or unjust?
Thomas Sowell
Image
Some of the people on death row today might not be there if the courts had not been so lenient on them when they were first offenders.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Even squirrels know enough to store nuts, so that they will have something to eat when food gets scarce. But the welfare state has spawned a whole class of people who spend everything they get when times are good, and look to others to provide for their food and other basic needs when times turn bad.
Thomas Sowell
Image
For the anointed, traditions are likely to be seen as the dead hand of the past, relics of a less enlightened age, and not as the distilled experience of millions who faced similar human vicissitudes before.
Thomas Sowell
Image
Too much of what is called 'education' is little more than an expensive isolation from reality.
Thomas Sowell
Image
...Politics is not about facts. It is about what politicians can get people to believe.
Thomas Sowell