Thorstein Veblen Quotes - Page 2

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• A protective tariff is a typical conspiracy in restraint of trade.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Typical, Tariffs, Libertarian

  Thorstein Veblen (2016). “THE ENGINEERS AND THE PRICE SYSTEM: From the Author of The Theory of the Leisure Class, The Theory of Business Enterprise, Imperial Germany and the Industrial Revolution & The Higher Learning in America”, p.12, e-artnow

  18 Copy quote

• As a matter of selective necessity, man is an agent. He is, in his own apprehension, a centre of unfolding impulsive activity-'teleological activity.' He is an agent seeking in every act the accomplishment of some concrete, objective, impersonal end. By force of being such an agent, he is possessed of a taste for effective work, and a distaste for futile effort.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Men, Effort, Agents

  Thorstein Veblen (2016). “THORSTEIN VEBLEN Ultimate Collection: 8 Books & 50+ Business Essays and Articles in Warfare and Economics: The Theory of the Leisure Class, The Theory of Business Enterprise, The Higher Learning In America, Panem et Circenses, The Vested Interests and the Common Man, The Use of Loan Credit in Business…”, p.16, e-artnow

  21 Copy quote

• In order to stand well in the eyes of the community, it is necessary to come up to a certain, somewhat indefinite, conventional standard of wealth.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Life, Success, Eye

  Thorstein Veblen (2012). “The Theory of the Leisure Class”, p.27, Courier Corporation

  10 Copy quote

• From the ownership of women the concept of ownership extends itself to include the products of their industry, and so there arises the ownership of things as well as of persons.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Ownership, Arise, Wells

  Thorstein Veblen (2016). “THE THEORY OF THE LEISURE CLASS: An Economic Study of American Institutions and a Social Critique of Conspicuous Consumption: Development of Institutions That Shape Society and Influence the Livelihood of Citizens: Based on Sociological & Economical Theories of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Adam Smith and Herbert Spencer”, p.17, e-artnow

  9 Copy quote

• Into the cultural and technological system of the modern world, the patriotic spirit fits like dust in the eyes and sand in the bearings. Its net contribution to the outcome is obscuration, distrust, and retardation at every point where it touches the fortunes of modern mankind.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Patriotic, Eye, Dust

  Thorstein Veblen (2006). “An Inquiry Into the Nature of Peace, and the Terms of Its Perpetuation”, p.40, Cosimo, Inc.

  9 Copy quote

• In point of substantial merit the law school belongs in the modern university no more than a school of fencing or dancing.

  Thorstein Veblen

  School, Law, Dancing

  The Higher Learning in America ch. 7 (1918)

  73 Copy quote

• The basis on which good repute in any highly organized industrial community ultimately rests is pecuniary strength; and the means of showing pecuniary strength, and so of gaining or retaining a good name, are leisure and a conspicuous consumption of goods.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Mean, Names, Community

  Thorstein Veblen (2016). “THE THEORY OF THE LEISURE CLASS: An Economic Study of American Institutions and a Social Critique of Conspicuous Consumption: Development of Institutions That Shape Society and Influence the Livelihood of Citizens: Based on Sociological & Economical Theories of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Adam Smith and Herbert Spencer”, p.54, e-artnow

  87 Copy quote

• All business sagacity reduces itself in the last analysis to judicious use of sabotage.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Business, Analysis, Use

  Thorstein Veblen (2016). “THORSTEIN VEBLEN Ultimate Collection: 8 Books & 50+ Business Essays and Articles in Warfare and Economics: The Theory of the Leisure Class, The Theory of Business Enterprise, The Higher Learning In America, Panem et Circenses, The Vested Interests and the Common Man, The Use of Loan Credit in Business…”, p.1089, e-artnow

  19 Copy quote

• It is always sound business to take any obtainable net gain, at any cost, and at any risk to the rest of the community.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Business, Community, Risk

  Thorstein Veblen (1994). “Absentee Ownership: Business Enterprise in Recent Times : the Case of America”, p.191, Transaction Publishers

  14 Copy quote

• The walking stick serves the purpose of an advertisement that the bearer's hands are employed otherwise than in useful effort, and it therefore has utility as an evidence of leisure.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Hands, Walking Sticks, Effort

  Thorstein Veblen (2011). “Theory of the Leisure Class”, p.184, BoD – Books on Demand

  14 Copy quote

• The corset is?a mutilation, undergone for the purpose of lowering the subject's vitalityand rendering her permanentlyand obviously unfit for work.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Purpose, Mutilation, Rendering

  1899 Theory of the Leisure Class.

  4 Copy quote

• So soon as the possession of property becomes the basis of popular esteem, therefore, it becomes also a requisite to that complacency which we call self-respect.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Self, Complacency, Possession

  Thorstein Veblen (1993). “A Veblen Treasury: From Leisure Class to War, Peace, and Capitalism”, p.20, M.E. Sharpe

  7 Copy quote

• There are few things that so touch us with instinctive revulsion as a breach of decorum.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Respect, Decorum, Revulsion

  Thorstein Veblen (2016). “THE THEORY OF THE LEISURE CLASS: An Economic Study of American Institutions and a Social Critique of Conspicuous Consumption: Development of Institutions That Shape Society and Influence the Livelihood of Citizens: Based on Sociological & Economical Theories of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Adam Smith and Herbert Spencer”, p.32, e-artnow

  10 Copy quote

• The taste of the more recent accessions to the leisure class proper and of the middle and lower classes still requires a pecuniary beauty to supplement the aesthetic beauty, even in those objects which are primarily admired for the beauty that belongs to them as natural growths.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Class, Aesthetic Beauty, Growth

  Thorstein Veblen (2012). “The Theory of the Leisure Class”, p.93, Courier Corporation

  8 Copy quote

• It frequently happens that an element of the standard of living which set out with being primarily wasteful, ends with becoming, in the apprehension of the consumer, a necessary of life.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Elements, Becoming, Ends

  Thorstein Veblen (1993). “A Veblen Treasury: From Leisure Class to War, Peace, and Capitalism”, p.55, M.E. Sharpe

  10 Copy quote

• Conservatism, being an upper-class characteristic, is decorous; and conversely, innovation, being a lower-class phenomenon, is vulgar. ...Innovation is bad form.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Class, Innovation, Characteristics

  Thorstein Veblen (2012). “The Theory of the Leisure Class”, p.124, Courier Corporation

  5 Copy quote

• The superior excellence imputed to the book, which imitates the products of antique and obsolete processes, is conceived to be chiefly a superior utility in the aesthetic respect; but it is not unusual to find a well-bred book-lover insisting that the clumsier product is also more serviceable as a vehicle of printed speech.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Book, Excellence, Speech

  Thorstein Veblen (1993). “A Veblen Treasury: From Leisure Class to War, Peace, and Capitalism”, p.88, M.E. Sharpe

  5 Copy quote

• The machine technology takes no cognizance of conventionally established rules of precedence; it knows neither manners nor breeding and can make no use of any of the attributes of worth.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Technology, Machines, Use

  Thorstein Veblen (2005). “The Theory of Business Enterprise”, p.148, Cosimo, Inc.

  5 Copy quote

• With the exception of the instinct of self-preservation, the propensity for emulation is probably the strongest and most alert and persistent of the economic motives proper. In an industrial community this propensity for emulation expresses itself in pecuniary emulation; and this, so far as regards the Western civilized communities of the present, is virtually equivalent to saying that it expresses itself in some form of conspicuous waste.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Self, Community, Waste

  The Theory of the Leisure Class ch. 5 (1899)

  5 Copy quote

• English orthography satisfies all the requirements of the canons of reputability under the law of conspicuous waste. It is archaic, cumbrous, and ineffective; its acquisition consumes much time and effort; failure to acquire it is easy of detection.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Law, Effort, Acquisition

  Thorstein Veblen (2012). “The Theory of the Leisure Class”, p.255, Courier Corporation

  4 Copy quote

• Conservatism is the maintenance of conventions already in force.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Consistency, Maintenance, Tradition

  Thorstein Veblen (2016). “BUSINESS & ECONOMICS Premium Collection: 25+ Titles in One Volume: The Theory of Business Enterprise, The Higher Learning in America, The Vested Interests and the Common Man, On the Nature of Capital…: The Theory of the Leisure Class, The Beginning of Ownership, The Preconceptions of Economic Science, The Industrial System and the Captains of Industry, The Socialist Economics of Karl Marx…”, p.396, e-artnow

  7 Copy quote

• In aesthetic theory it might be extremely difficult, if not quite impracticable, to draw a line between the canon of classicism, or regard for the archaic, and the canon of beauty.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Lines, Might, Canon

  Thorstein Veblen (1993). “A Veblen Treasury: From Leisure Class to War, Peace, and Capitalism”, p.89, M.E. Sharpe

  9 Copy quote

• In the rare cases where it occurs, a failure to increase one's visible consumption when the means for an increase are at hand is felt in popular apprehension to call for explanation, and unworthy motives of miserliness are imputed.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Mean, Hands, Increase

  Thorstein Veblen (2016). “BUSINESS & ECONOMICS Premium Collection: 25+ Titles in One Volume: The Theory of Business Enterprise, The Higher Learning in America, The Vested Interests and the Common Man, On the Nature of Capital…: The Theory of the Leisure Class, The Beginning of Ownership, The Preconceptions of Economic Science, The Industrial System and the Captains of Industry, The Socialist Economics of Karl Marx…”, p.69, e-artnow

  9 Copy quote

• While the proximate ground of discrimination may be of another kind, still the pervading principle and abiding test of good breeding is the requirement of a substantial and patent waste of time.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Principles, Abiding, Patents

  Thorstein Veblen (1993). “A Veblen Treasury: From Leisure Class to War, Peace, and Capitalism”, p.31, M.E. Sharpe

  10 Copy quote

• The office of the leisure class in social evolution is to retard the movement and to conserve what is obsolescent. This proposition is by no means novel; it has long been one of the commonplaces of popular opinion.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Mean, Class, Long

  Thorstein Veblen (2012). “The Theory of the Leisure Class”, p.130, Courier Corporation

  5 Copy quote

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