Quote

Profit is vital to human well-being. Profit is the payment to entrepreneurs just as wages are payments to labor, interest to capital and rent to land. In order to earn profits in free markets, entrepreneurs must identify and satisfy human wants and do so in a way that economizes on society's scarce resources.

Walter E. Williams

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Walter E. Williams
Age: 84 †
Born: 1936
Born: March 31
Died: 2020
Died: December 1
Columnist
Economist
Journalist
Radio Personality
University Teacher
Philadelphia
Pennsylvania
Walter Williams
Walter Edward Williams
Well
Land
Earn
Rent
Must
Interest
Vital
Scarce
Way
Society
Capital
Profits
Free
Entrepreneur
Payment
Order
Profit
Satisfy
Wells
Labor
Markets
Human
Resources
Wages
Payments
Humans
Wants
Identify
Entrepreneurs

More quotes by Walter E. Williams

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Thou shalt not steal unless thou hast a majority vote in Congress.... I'm healthy subsidized prescription drugs won't do me much good. I'd be willing to forego my prescription drugs if Congress would force some young American to mow my lawn.
Walter E. Williams
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Whether we want to own up to it or not, the welfare state has done what Jim Crow, gross discrimination and poverty could not have done. It has contributed to the breakdown of the black family structure and has helped establish a set of values alien to traditional values of high moral standards, hard work and achievement.
Walter E. Williams
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Politicians exploit economic illiteracy.
Walter E. Williams
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If the Constitution framers would come back today, they would have contempt for most of us.
Walter E. Williams
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If grade inflation continues, a college bachelor's degree will have just as much credibility as a high school diploma.
Walter E. Williams
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I learned that you have to evaluate the effects of public policy as opposed to intentions.
Walter E. Williams
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One of the wonderful things about free markets is that the path to greater wealth comes not from looting, plundering and enslaving one's fellow man, as it has throughout most of human history, but by serving and pleasing him.
Walter E. Williams
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Charity is reaching into one's own pockets to assist his fellow man in need. Reaching into someone else's pocket to assist one's fellow man hardly qualifies as charity. When done privately, we deem it theft, and the individual risks jail time.
Walter E. Williams
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Maybe I'm overly pessimistic, but most of Africa is a continent without much hope for its people... What [Africa] needs, the West cannot give. ...what Africans need is personal liberty...[and] guarantees of private property rights and rule of law.
Walter E. Williams
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We should view our government the way we should a friendly, cuddly lion. Just because he's friendly and cuddly shouldn't blind us to the fact that he's still got teeth and claws.
Walter E. Williams
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Saying the Constitution is a living document is the same as saying we don't have a Constitution.
Walter E. Williams
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I prefer a thief to a Congressman. A thief will take your money and be on his way, but a Congressman will stand there and bore you with the reasons why he took it.
Walter E. Williams
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Whenever there's a tragedy involving gun use, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, the gun-control lobby and the news media seize it as another opportunity to exploit the emotions of uninformed American people for political gain.
Walter E. Williams
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All we have to do now is to inform the public that the payment of social security taxes is voluntary and watch the mass exodus.
Walter E. Williams
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Reduced employment opportunities is one effect of minimum wage legislation. The minimum wage law has imposed incalculable harm on the disadvantaged members of our society. The only moral thing to do is to repeal it.
Walter E. Williams
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If one person has a right to something he did not earn, of necessity it requires that another person not have a right to something that he did earn.
Walter E. Williams
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Cap and trade is just about the most effective tool for controlling most economic activity short of openly declaring ourselves a communist nation and it's a radical environmentalist's dream come true.
Walter E. Williams
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Increases in money supply are what constitute inflation, and a general rise in prices is the symptom.
Walter E. Williams
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Discrimination is simply the act of choice. Scarcity requires us to choose scarcity is the cause of discrimination!
Walter E. Williams
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Powerful government tends to draw into it people with bloated egos, people who think they know more than everyone else and have little hesitance in coercing their fellow man. Or as Nobel Laureate Friedrich Hayek said, in government, the scum rises to the top.
Walter E. Williams