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Thomas Sowell Quotes

Total quotes: 21
“As many have warned in the past, freedom is unlikely to be lost all at once and openly. It is far more likely to be eroded away, bit by bit, amid glittering promises and expressions of noble ideas.”
— Thomas Sowell, Thomas Sowell
Tagged: Freedom, Liberty
“Insulating people from reality produces unrealistic people. It doesn't matter whether they are welfare recipients, spoiled rich kids, tenured professors in the ivy league, or federal judges with lifetime appointments.”
— Thomas Sowell, Barbarians inside the Gates and Other Controversial Essays(Hoover Institution Press Publication)
Tagged: Insulation, Being Blocked Off From The World, Isolated Communities, Ideological Ghettos, College Professors, Tenure
“There seems to be a growing number of people who think that the world should adjust to them, while they don't have to show any consideration to anyone.”
— Thomas Sowell, Random Thoughts
Tagged: Entitlement, consideration
“There has never been a shortage of people eager to draw up blueprints for running other people’s lives.”
— Thomas Sowell, Discrimination and Disparities
Tagged: ruin, Toxic People, being mean
“Few skills are so well rewarded as the ability to convince parasites that they are victims.”
— Thomas Sowell, Controversial Essays(Hoover Institution Press Publication)
Tagged: Parasites
“You can't stop people from saying bad things about you. All you can do is make them liars.”
— Thomas Sowell, Barbarians inside the Gates and Other Controversial Essays(Hoover Institution Press Publication)
Tagged: Judgement, Negative Statements, Slander
“People don't usually grow up when there are other people who make excuses for their immaturity.”
— Thomas Sowell, Boomers and Boomerangs
Tagged: Growing Up, Non-Judgemental, Judgement
“The least productive people are usually the ones who are most in favor of holding meetings.”
— Thomas Sowell, Controversial Essays(Hoover Institution Press Publication)
Tagged: Meetings, Business, Productivity
“Reality does not go away when it is ignored.”
— Thomas Sowell, Intellectuals and Society: Revised and Expanded Edition
Tagged: Reality, Facing Reality
“The first lesson of economics is scarcity: there is never enough of anything to fully satisfy all those who want it. The first lesson of politics is to disregard the first lesson of economics.”
— Thomas Sowell, Is Reality Optional?: And Other Essays(Hoover Institution Press Publication)
Tagged: Economics vs. Politics, Scarcity, Society, Politics
“Envy plus rhetoric equals 'social justice.”
— Thomas Sowell, Is Reality Optional?: And Other Essays(Hoover Institution Press Publication)
Tagged: Envy, Social Justice
“The key feature of Communist propaganda has been the depiction of people who are more productive as mere exploiters of others.”
— Thomas Sowell, Compassion Versus Guilt and Other Essays
Tagged: Communist Propaganda, Communism, Socialism, Communism Vs. Capitalism
“Understanding the limitations of human beings is the beginning of wisdom.”
— Thomas Sowell, Compassion Versus Guilt and Other Essays
Tagged: Conservative Logic, Human Nature, Limits of Human Beings, Weaknesses of Humans
“The case for the political left looks more plausible on the surface but is harder to keep believing in as you become more experienced.”
— Thomas Sowell, Compassion Versus Guilt and Other Essays
Tagged: American Politics, Left versus Right, Republicans vs. Democrats
“One of the grand fallacies of our time is that something beneficial should be subsidized.”
— Thomas Sowell, Compassion Versus Guilt and Other Essays
Tagged: Capitalism, Government vs. Corporations, Societal Organization
“Competition does a much more effective job than government at protecting consumers.”
— Thomas Sowell, Compassion Versus Guilt and Other Essays
Tagged: Capitalism, Government vs. Corporations, Consumer Protection, Societal Organization
“Facts do not 'speak for themselves.' They speak for or against competing theories. Facts divorced from theory or visions are mere isolated curiosities.”
— Thomas Sowell, A Conflict of Visions: Ideological Origins of Political Struggles
Tagged: Facts, The Context of Facts, Theoretical Understanding of Facts
“Before attempting to determine the effect of institutions, it is necessary to consider the inherent circumstances, constraints, and impelling forces at work in the environment within which the institutional mechanisms function.”
— Thomas Sowell, Knowledge And Decisions
Tagged: Institutional Logics, Understanding Complex Societal Machinery
“Ideas are everywhere, but knowledge is rare.”
— Thomas Sowell, Knowledge And Decisions
Tagged: Ideas, Knowledge, True Intellectual Understanding
“Freedom has cost too much blood and agony to be relinquished at the cheap price of rhetoric.”
— Thomas Sowell, Knowledge And Decisions
Tagged: Freedom, Talk Is Cheap
“Socialism in general has a record of failure so blatant that only an intellectual could ignore or evade it.”
— Thomas Sowell, The Thomas Sowell Reader
Tagged: Against Socialsim, Socialism
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