John Kenneth Galbraith Quotes

The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Politics, Philosophy, Moral

Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it's just the opposite.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Finance, Capitalism, Communism

It is a far, far better thing to have a firm anchor in nonsense than to put out on the troubled seas of thought.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Thought, Put, Far

Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Mind, Busy, Between

The only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectable.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Economic, Function, Astrology

Economics is extremely useful as a form of employment for economists.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Government, Economics, Useful

The conventional view serves to protect us from the painful job of thinking.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Job, Thinking, Painful

The salary of the chief executive of a large corporation is not a market award for achievement. It is frequently in the nature of a warm personal gesture by the individual to himself.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Nature, Personal, Himself

We all agree that pessimism is a mark of superior intellect.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Intelligence, Intellect, Superior

Politics is the art of choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Politics, Art, Between

All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Leadership, Time, Great

Liberalism is, I think, resurgent. One reason is that more and more people are so painfully aware of the alternative.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Politics, Reason, Aware

More die in the United States of too much food than of too little.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Food, Die, United

All successful revolutions are the kicking in of a rotten door.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Successful, Door, Kicking

Humor is richly rewarding to the person who employs it. It has some value in gaining and holding attention, but it has no persuasive value at all.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Humor, Person, Attention

In economics, the majority is always wrong.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Wrong, Economics, Majority

We can safely abandon the doctrine of the eighties, namely that the rich were not working because they had too little money, the poor because they had much.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Money, Working, Rich

Few can believe that suffering, especially by others, is in vain. Anything that is disagreeable must surely have beneficial economic effects.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Others, Suffering, Few

Nothing is so admirable in politics as a short memory.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Politics, Nothing, Short

Wealth, in even the most improbable cases, manages to convey the aspect of intelligence.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Finance, Wealth, Improbable

Total physical and mental inertia are highly agreeable, much more so than we allow ourselves to imagine. A beach not only permits such inertia but enforces it, thus neatly eliminating all problems of guilt. It is now the only place in our overly active world that does.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Place, Problems, Ourselves

The process by which banks create money is so simple that the mind is repelled.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Money, Mind, Simple

In any great organization it is far, far safer to be wrong with the majority than to be right alone.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Great, Alone, Wrong

Politics is not the art of the possible. It consists in choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Politics, Art, Between

A person buying ordinary products in a supermarket is in touch with his deepest emotions.
John Kenneth Galbraith

Person, Touch, Emotions

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Biography

Nationality: American

Type: Economist

Born: October 15, 1908

Died: April 29, 2006

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