Incentives Quotes - Page 19

• In the United States especially, politics and economics don’t mix well. Politicians have all sorts of reasons to pass all sorts of laws that, as well-meaning as they may be, fail to account for the way real people respond to real-world incentives.

  Steven Levitt

  Real, Law, People

  Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner (2010). “SuperFreakonomics, Illustrated edition: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance”, p.44, Harper Collins

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• When a thoughtful human being has overcome incentives to vice and is aware of having done his bitter duty, he finds himself in a state that could be called happiness, a state of contentment and peace of mind in which virtue is its own reward.

  Immanuel Kant

  Happiness, Thoughtful, Mind

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• Goals give you more than a reason to get up in the morning; they are an incentive to keep you going all day.

  Harvey Mackay

  Moving On, Morning, Giving

  Harvey Mackay (2011). “The Mackay MBA of Selling in the Real World”, Penguin

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• Any property that's open to common use gets destroyed. Because everyone has incentive to use it to the max, but no one has incentive to maintain it.

  Neal Stephenson

  Max, Use, Common

  Neal Stephenson (2007). “Zodiac”, p.68, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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• We're all animals, that we all respond to the same stimuli. If you want to motivate somebody not to have premarital sex, or motivate black bears not to go diving into dumpsters, first you have to think about why they do it. Telling them to stop isn't going to help. There has to be some incentive for them to alter their behavior.

  Adam Carolla

  Sex, Thinking, Animal

  "‘How Dare You!’: Q&A with Adam Carolla". Interview with Joshua Kors, www.huffingtonpost.com. November 9, 2010.

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• Every single great idea that has marked the 21st century, the 20th century and the 19th century has required government vision and government incentive.

  Joe Biden

  Government, Ideas, Vision

  "Glenn Beck: The Deindustrialization of America". "Glenn Back" with Glenn Beck, www.foxnews.com. October 28,2010.

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• We need to align the incentives so that colleges have an incentive to keep down their costs... to graduate students on time with degrees in areas where they're going to be able to get jobs and going to be able to pay back those loans.

  Elizabeth Warren

  Jobs, College, Needs

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• [High income tax rates] not only check consumption but discourage investment and encourage...the avoidance of taxes [rather] than the production of goods.[...]Our present tax system...reduces the financial incentives for personal effort, investment, and risk-taking.

  John F. Kennedy

  Effort, Risk, Income

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• You must have the confidence to override people with more credentials than you whose cognition is impaired by incentive-caused bias or some similar psychological force that is obviously present. But there are also cases where you have to recognize that you have no wisdom to add - and that your best course is to trust some expert.

  Charlie Munger

  People, Experts, Add

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• I don't believe in cancer walks. Well, I believe in them because they exist but I'd rather just give money straight up and save my Saturday afternoon. I can make my own t-shirt, that's not incentive. Plus I don't think cancer responds to how far people walk. I don't think cancer's sitting at home, 'What? How many people walked how far? How many people walked how far wearing the same shirt? That's crazy! I'm out of here!' Remission.

  Hannibal Buress

  Crazy, Cancer, Believe

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• One of the best ways to make growth personal is to give employees a share in their firm, a real incentive to go the extra mile, more of a 'John Lewis Economy' if you like...We know that firms where employees are engaged and own a stake do at least as well as other companies in the good times and have performed even better in recent bad times. Expanding and recruiting at a much faster rate and achieving better productivity...So, why do they make up just 2% of our business landscape?

  Nick Clegg

  Real, Giving, Growth

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• I love when problems have simple solutions. Cold medicine. Umbrellas. Condoms. Tax incentives & subsidies attracting favored industries.

  Greg Fitzsimmons

  Simple, Medicine, Subsidies

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• The tax incentives are things the music business can emulate. If I own Yesterday by the Beatles and I go to a bank and try to borrow $10,000 and use that song as collateral, they wouldn't know what to do. They would run me out of the bank. Whereas if we get specialized people who know how to appraise the value of intellectual property like songs, catalogs and master recordings, they know how to put some type of value on it. They have this in Nashville and Los Angeles. New Orleans is just starting to get it.

  Chris Thomas King

  Running, Song, New Orleans

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• The intensity of a conviction that a hypothesis is true has no bearing on whether it is true or false. The importance of the strength of our conviction is only to provide a proportionately strong incentive to find out if the hypothesis will stand up to critical evaluation.

  Peter Medawar

  Strong, True Or False, Evaluation

  Peter Brian Medawar (1981). “Advice to a young scientist”

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