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In this era of political correctness, some people seem unaware that being squeamish about words can mean being blind to realities.

Thomas Sowell

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Thomas Sowell
Age: 94
Born: 1930
Born: June 30
Economist
University Teacher
Gastonia
North Carolina
Blind
Seem
Words
Political
Squeamish
Reality
Unaware
Seems
Correctness
Mean
Realities
People
Eras

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Welfare states on both sides of the Atlantic have discovered that largesse to losers does not reduce their hostility to society, but only increases it. Far from producing gratitude, generosity is seen as an admission of guilt, and the reparations as inadequate compensations for injustices - leading to worsening behavior by the recipients.
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The minimum wage law very cleverly is misnamed. The real minimum wage is zero. That is what many inexperienced and low skilled people receive as a result of legislation that makes it illegal to pay them what they are currently worth to an employer.
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However widespread the desire to be free, that is wholly different from a desire to live in a society where others are free.
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Just what is it that academics have to fear if they stand up for common decency, instead of letting campus barbarians run amok?
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Fairness' is one of the great mantras of the left. Since everyone has his own definition of fairness, that word is a blank check for the expansion of government power. What fairness means in practice is that third parties -- busybodies -- can prevent mutual accommodations by others.
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The demands of unbounded individualism need to be weighed in the light of inherent social constraints which can only change their form but cannot be eliminated without eliminating civilization.
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Economic policies need to be analyzed in terms of the incentives they create, rather than the hopes that inspired them.
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Do countries with strong gun control laws have lower murder rates? Only if you cherry-pick the data.
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You can only confiscate the wealth that exists at a given moment. You cannot confiscate future wealth - and that future wealth is less likely to be produced when people see that it is going to be confiscated.
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Wise men wrote the Constitution, but clever judges have been destroying it, bit by bit, turning it into an instrument of arbitrary judicial power, instead of a limitation on all government power.
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Even if the government spends itself into bankruptcy and the economy still does not recover, Keynesians can always say that it would have worked if only the government had spent more.
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No matter how disastrously some policy has turned out, anyone who criticizes it can expect to hear: 'But what would you replace it with?' When you put out a fire, what do you replace it with?
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Those government officials who want more power are not going to stop unless they get stopped.
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If you are not prepared to use force to defend civilization, then be prepared to accept barbarism.
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In a democracy, we have always had to worry about the ignorance of the uneducated. Today we have to worry about the ignorance of people with college degrees.
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One of the painful signs of years of dumbed-down education is how many people are unable to make a coherent argument. They can vent their emotions, question other people's motives, make bold assertions, repeat slogans-- anything except reason.
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If the battle for civilization comes down to the wimps versus the barbarians, the barbarians are going to win.
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Weighing benefits against costs is the way most people make decisions - and the way most businesses make decisions, if they want to stay in business. Only in government is any benefit, however small, considered to be worth any cost, however large.
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'Global warming' is just the latest in a long line of hysterical crusades to which we seem to be increasingly susceptible.
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The political left has been weak on protecting society from criminals for more than two centuries.
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