Robert Reich Quotes & Sayings

Every organization, no matter who it is, just follow the money. — Robert Reich

When I was a kid, the bigger boys would pick on me. So I got an idea that I would make alliances with older boys, like just one or two, who would be my protectors. — Robert Reich

In truth, government has been good to Wall Street and big business. — Robert Reich

The monied interests are doing what they do best - making money. The rest of us need to do what we can do best - use our voices, our vigor, and our votes. — Robert Reich

No economy can continue to function when the vast middle class and everybody else don't have enough purchasing power to buy what the economy is capable of producing without going deeper and deeper into debt. — Robert Reich

The Tea Party grew out of indignation over the Wall Street bailout - an indignation shared by the vast majority of Americans. But the Tea Party ended up directing its ire at government rather than at big business and Wall Street. — Robert Reich

Some argue shareholder capitalism has proven more efficient. It has moved economic resources to where they're most productive, and thereby enabled the economy to grow faster. — Robert Reich

One thing I've learned from 35 years in the classroom is that people learn best when they are laughing, when they are emotionally hit, that it's both the brain and the heart. — Robert Reich

Yes, the rich will find ways to avoid paying more taxes, courtesy of clever accountants and tax attorneys. But this has always been the case, regardless of where the tax rate is set. — Robert Reich

Sugary drinks are blamed for increasing the rates of chronic disease and obesity in America. Yet efforts to reduce their consumption through taxes or other measures have gone nowhere. The beverage industry has spent millions defeating them. — Robert Reich

Those who take their money abroad in an effort to avoid paying American taxes should lose their American citizenship. — Robert Reich

If you want to be a change agent, you have to ready to fail. — Robert Reich

There is a deep desire to change the power structure. — Robert Reich

The curious thing is Americans don't mind individual mandates when they come in the form of payroll taxes to buy mandatory public insurance. In fact, that's the system we call Social Security and Medicare, and both are so popular politicians dare not touch them. — Robert Reich

Money buys the most experienced teachers, less-crowded classrooms, high-quality teaching materials, and after-school programs. — Robert Reich

Nations are becoming less relevant in a world where everyone and everything is interconnected. The connections that matter most are again becoming more personal. — Robert Reich

Globalization and free trade do spur economic growth, and they lead to lower prices on many goods. — Robert Reich

As public schools deteriorate, the upper-middle class and wealthy send their kids to private ones. As public pools and playgrounds decay, the better-off buy memberships in private tennis and swimming clubs. As public hospitals decline, the well-off pay premium rates for private care. — Robert Reich

The federal budget deficit isn't the nation's major economic problem and deficit reduction shouldn't be our major goal.
Our problem is lack of good jobs and sufficient growth, and our goal must be to revive both. — Robert Reich

Look, any cut in greenhouse gases is going to be expensive for American consumers, who are in no mood to bear additional costs. — Robert Reich

We can't know in advance what history is going to say, but I would be utterly amazed and surprised if American invasion to Iraq from the beginning of its inception, were not judged to be an utter failure and a terrible, terrible thing for the world. — Robert Reich

The intellectual equipment needed for the job of the future is an ability to define problems, quickly assimilate relevant data, conceptualize and reorganize the information, make deductive and inductive leaps with it, ask hard questions about it, discuss findings with colleagues, work collaboratively to find solutions and then convince others. — Robert Reich

Teachers, social workers, public lawyers who bring companies to justice, government accountants who try to make sure money is spent as it should be - all need at least four years of college. — Robert Reich

We don't have to sit by and watch our meritocracy be replaced by a permanent aristocracy, and our democracy be undermined by dynastic wealth. — Robert Reich

Economies are risky. Some industries rise, and others implode, like housing. Some places get richer, and others drop, like Atlantic City. Some people get new jobs that pay better, many lose their jobs or their wages. — Robert Reich

Rather than subsidize 'American' exporters, it makes more sense to subsidize any global company - to the extent it's adding to its exports from the United States. — Robert Reich

Most financiers, corporate lawyers, lobbyists, and management consultants are competing with other financiers, lawyers, lobbyists, and management consultants in zero-sum games that take money out of one set of pockets and put it into another. — Robert Reich

More people are killed by stray bullets every day in America than have been killed by Ebola here. More are dying because of poverty and hunger. — Robert Reich

A leader is someone who steps back from the entire system and tries to build a more collaborative, more innovative system that will work over the long term. — Robert Reich

We already have an annual wealth tax on homes, the major asset of the middle class. It's called the property tax. Why not a small annual tax on the value of stocks and bonds, the major assets of the wealthy? — Robert Reich

We are creating a one size fits all system that needlessly brands many young people as failures, when they might thrive if offered a different education whose progress was measured differently. Paradoxically we're embracing standardized tests just when the economy is eliminating standardized jobs. — Robert Reich

Evidence suggests jobs are crucial not only to economic well-being but also to self-esteem. — Robert Reich

Those at the top would do better with a smaller share of a booming economy that elicits a positive politics than they will do with an ever-larger share of an anemic economy that fuels the politics of anger. — Robert Reich

Bankruptcy laws allow companies to smoothly reorganize, but not college graduates burdened by student loans. — Robert Reich

So why don't nurses do home visits to Americans with acute conditions? Hospitals aren't paid for it. — Robert Reich

Inequality is bad for everyone, not just the middle class and the poor — Robert Reich

As long as the big banks are allowed to remain big, their political leverage over Washington will remain big. And as long as their political leverage remains big, the taxpayer and economic tab for the next mess they create will be big. — Robert Reich

If we give up on politics, we're done for. Powerlessness is a self-fulfilling prophesy. — Robert Reich

America has become the most unequal society among advanced countries, and rich people are now free to spend as much money on political campaigns as they wish. — Robert Reich

Britain's is traditionally a rigid class society. — Robert Reich

Government subsidies to elite private universities take the form of tax deductions for people who make charitable contributions to them. — Robert Reich

A lot of attention has been going to social values - abortion, gay rights, other divisive issues - but economic values are equally important. — Robert Reich

Corporations are not people, despite what the Supreme Court says, and they don't need or deserve handouts. — Robert Reich

America spends a fortune on drugs: more per person than any other nation on earth, even though Americans are no healthier than the citizens of other advanced nations. — Robert Reich

Any bank that is too big to fail is too big. Period. — Robert Reich

The job creators are members of America's vast middle class and the poor, whose purchases cause businesses to expand and invest. — Robert Reich

What someone is paid has little or no relationship to what their work is worth to society. — Robert Reich

If you give up on democracy, you might as well give up on everything. — Robert Reich

It's not government's business what people do in their private bedrooms. — Robert Reich

Can we please agree that in the real world, corporations exist for one purpose and one purpose only - to make as much money as possible, which means cutting costs as much as possible? — Robert Reich

Anyone believing the TPP is good for Americans take note: The foreign subsidiaries of U.S.-based corporations could just as easily challenge any U.S. government regulation they claim unfairly diminishes their profits - say, a regulation protecting American consumers from unsafe products or unhealthy foods, investors from fraudulent securities or predatory lending, workers from unsafe working conditions, taxpayers from another bailout of Wall Street, or the environment from toxic emissions. — Robert Reich

The dirty little secret is that both houses of Congress are irrelevant ... America's domestic policy is now being run by Alan Greenspan and the Federal Reserve, and America's foreign policy is now being run by the International Monetary Fund [IMF] ... when the president decides to go to war, he no longer needs a declaration of war from Congress. — Robert Reich

Average working people need more fresh starts. Big corporations, banks, and Donald Trump need fewer. — Robert Reich

In the life of a nation, few ideas are more dangerous than good solutions to the wrong problems. — Robert Reich

The largest party in America, by the way, is neither the Democrats nor the Republicans. It's the party of non-voters. — Robert Reich

The only way to make sure no bank is too big to fail is to make sure no bank is too big. — Robert Reich

Limits should be placed on how big big banks can become. — Robert Reich

When top executives get huge pay hikes at the same time as middle-level and hourly workers lose their jobs and retirement savings, or have to accept negligible pay raises and cuts in health and pension benefits, company morale plummets. I hear it all the time from employees: This company, they say, is being run only for the benefit of the people at the top. So why should we put in extra effort, commit extra hours, take on extra responsibilities? We'll do the minimum, even cut corners. This is often the death knell of a company. — Robert Reich

Those who analogize the federal budget to a family's budget must know nothing about either. — Robert Reich

One tax dodge often used by multi-national companies is to squirrel their earnings abroad in foreign subsidiaries located in countries where taxes are lower. — Robert Reich

One of the things I tell my students is that if you want to understand what's been going on and also what needs to be done, you've got to get out of the blame game. Some people on the left want to blame the rich and corporations. Some people on the right want to blame the poor and government. Either of those frames of reference gets you nowhere and they aren't even truthful. You've got to understand the dynamic itself. — Robert Reich

The generosity of the super-rich is sometimes proffered as evidence they're contributing as much to the nation's well-being as they did decades ago when they paid a much larger share of their earnings in taxes. — Robert Reich

Medical costs are soaring because our health-care system is totally screwed up. Doctors and hospitals have every incentive to spend on unnecessary tests, drugs, and procedures. — Robert Reich

Terrorism itself is not the greatest danger we face, — Robert Reich

By the mid-1950s, more than a third of all America workers in the private sector were unionized. And the unions demanded and received a fair slice of the American pie. — Robert Reich

I grew up poor. My mother raised a family of four on between $9,000 and $15,000 a year. — Robert Reich

If you ever want to get a sense of your own personal failure, look at yourself trying to get across a point that nobody is listening to and the situation gets worse and worse. — Robert Reich

The only way to grow the economy in a way that benefits the bottom 90 percent is to change the structure of the economy. At the least, this requires stronger unions and a higher minimum wage. — Robert Reich

Conservatives believe the economy functions better if the rich have more money and everyone else has less. But they're wrong. It's just the opposite. — Robert Reich

Media outlets that are exploiting Ebola because they want a sensational story and politicians using it to their own ends ought to be ashamed. — Robert Reich

In reality, most of America's poor work hard, often in two or more jobs. — Robert Reich

Cynicism is the largest obstacle to social change. Cynicism is dangerous because people throw up their hands and say, "Well it's not possible. Why should I even try?" — Robert Reich

True patriotism isn't cheap. It's about taking on a fair share of the burden of keeping America going. — Robert Reich

Drug company payments to doctors are a small part of a much larger strategy by Big Pharma to clean our pockets. — Robert Reich

What are called 'public schools' in many of America's wealthy communities aren't really 'public' at all. In effect, they're private schools, whose tuition is hidden away in the purchase price of upscale homes there, and in the corresponding property taxes. — Robert Reich

Before the rise of the nation-state, between the eighteenth and twentieth centuries, the world was mostly tribal. Tribes were united by language, religion, blood, and belief. They feared other tribes and often warred against them. — Robert Reich

The problem right now is jobs. The problem right now is the economy and economic growth. — Robert Reich

As we segregate by income into different communities, schools in lower-income areas have fewer resources than ever. — Robert Reich

We used to be so proud that our country offered far more economic opportunities than the feudal system in Great Britain, with its royal family, princesses and dukes. But social mobility in the UK is higher than in the US. Our social rift is as big as it was in the 1920s. — Robert Reich

We need a national infrastructure bank to rebuild our crumbling highways and water and sewer systems, thereby putting additional people back to work. — Robert Reich

News and images move so easily across borders that attitudes and aspirations are no longer especially national. Cyber-weapons, no longer the exclusive province of national governments, can originate in a hacker's garage. — Robert Reich

The United States is a safe harbor. — Robert Reich

The liberal ideal is that everyone should have fair access and fair opportunity. This is not equality of result. It's equality of opportunity. There's a fundamental difference. — Robert Reich

I don't think that our problem, our jobs problem, is fundamentally a problem of trade. I think it has much more to do with the fact that we have not sufficiently educated our population. We have not got out of this great recession with adequate stimulus and adequate fiscal and monetary policies over all. — Robert Reich

There are party leaders, big corporation, Wall Street. There are very wealthy individuals who kind of represent where the Democratic Party, the official Democratic Party was and to some extent still is. — Robert Reich

Too many young people graduate laden with debts that take years, if not decades, to pay off. — Robert Reich

Public fear isn't something to be played with. — Robert Reich

The Trans Pacific Partnership (and fast-track authority to whisk it through Congress without debate) is fast approaching. If you haven't seen our video about it, please watch. If you have, please share. And mobilize and organize friends and colleagues to call their senators and representatives to tell them to vote against this reprehensible deal. — Robert Reich

The 'free market' is the product of laws and rules continuously emanating from legislatures, executive departments, and courts. — Robert Reich

No company can be expected to build a nuclear reactor, an oil well, a coal mine, or anything else that's one hundred percent safe under all circumstances. The costs would be prohibitive. It's unreasonable to expect corporations to totally guard against small chances of every potential accident. — Robert Reich

Community colleges are great bargains. They avoid the fancy amenities four-year liberal arts colleges need in order to lure the children of the middle class. — Robert Reich

Our moral authority is as important, if not more important, than our troop strength or our high-tech weapons. We are rapidly losing that moral authority, not only in the Arab world but all over the world. — Robert Reich

Cutting taxes is not bad. But if you cut taxes on the wealthy, which is what they wanted to do, you're not helping people who need better schools and better infrastructure and healthcare. You're basically robbing the middle class and the poor to provide tax cuts to the rich. — Robert Reich

In the early 1970s, Milton Friedman argued that corporations should not be socially responsible because they had no mandate to be; they existed to make money, not to be charitable institutions. But in the economy of the 21st century, corporations cannot be socially responsible, if social responsibility is understood to mean sacrificing profits for the sake of some perceived social good. That's because competition has become so much more intense. — Robert Reich

Centrism is bogus. — Robert Reich

Social change occurs when the gap between the ideals that people hold and the reality that they see every day gets too large. — Robert Reich

You can't inspire people if you are going to be uninspiring. — Robert Reich

It is impossible to fight bullies merely by saying they're going too far. — Robert Reich

Not only do unemployment benefits help families who are hurting; they also put money into their pockets that they'll then spend - and their spending will keep other Americans in jobs. — Robert Reich

I think the Obama Administration has done a lousy job marketing and selling and explaining this entire thing. And, as a result, all of these right-wing front organizations financed by the Koch brothers, are blanketing the airwaves with lies about Obamacare. And people are scared. — Robert Reich