Government Spending Quotes

• Government spending is taxation. When you look at this, I've never heard of a poor person spending himself into prosperity; let alone I've never heard of a poor person taxing himself into prosperity.

  Arthur Laffer

  Government, Looks, Taxation

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• The real goal should be reduced government spending, rather than balanced budgets achieved by ever rising tax rates to cover ever rising spending.

  Thomas Sowell

  Real, Government, Goal

  Interview with John Hawkins, rightwingnews.com. February 8, 2012.

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• The greatest danger facing our nation isn't terrorism, global warming or the energy crisis. It is out-of-control, unbridled government spending.

  R. Lee Wrights

  Government, Energy, Global Warming

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• Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

  Ronald Reagan

  Freedom, Military, Moving

  Remarks to state chairs of National White House Conference on Small Business, 15 Aug. 1986

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• It is a popular delusion that the government wastes vast amounts of money through inefficiency and sloth. Enormous effort and elaborate planning are required to waste this much money.

  P. J. O'Rourke

  Government, Effort, Sloth

  P. J. O'Rourke (2007). “Parliament of Whores: A Lone Humorist Attempts to Explain the Entire U.S. Government”, p.36, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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• I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.

  James Madison

  Government, Liberty, Politics

  "Time Magazine: We Don't Need No Stinking Constitution" by Larry Elder, www.realclearpolitics.com. July 7, 2011.

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• The goal is to reduce the size and scope of government spending, not to focus on the deficit. The deficit is the symptom of the disease.

  Grover Norquist

  Government, Goal, Focus

  "Grover Norquist: 'The goal is to reduce the size and scope of government spending, not to focus on the deficit'". Interview with Ezra Klein, www.washingtonpost.com. March 9, 2011.

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• The difference between them and us is that we want to check government spending and they want to spend government checks.

  Ronald Reagan

  Government, Differences, Political

  Ronald Reagan, Bill Adler (1981). “The Reagan wit”, Jameson Books

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• We must have no carelessness in our dealings with public property or the expenditure of public money. Such a condition is characteristic either of an undeveloped people, or of a decadent civilization. America is neither.

  Calvin Coolidge

  Government, Civilization, America

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• Conservatives and liberals are kindred spirits as far as government spending is concerned. First, let's make sure we understand what government spending is. Since government has no resources of its own, and since there's no Tooth Fairy handing Congress the funds for the programs it enacts, we are forced to recognize that government spending is no less than the confiscation of one person's property to give it to another to whom it does not belong - in effect, legalized theft.

  Walter E. Williams

  Government, Giving, Liberty

  "All it takes is guts". Book by Walter E. Williams, 1987.

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• When they call the slightest spending reductions 'painful', we will say 'If government spending prevents pain, why are we suffering so much of it?' And 'If you want to experience real pain, just stay on the track we are on.'

  Mitch Daniels

  Pain, Real, Government

  Keynote Speech to the Conservative Political Action Committee, delivered 11 February 2011, Ronald Reagan Centennial Dinner, Washington, D.C.

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• First rule in government spending: why build one when you can have two at twice the price?

  Carl Sagan

  Two, Government, Firsts

  "Fictional character: S.R. Hadden". "Contact", www.imdb.com. 1997.

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• I am favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for any reason, whenever it's possible.

  Milton Friedman

  Cutting, Liberty, Taxation

  "Conservatives Betrayed: How George W. Bush and Other Big Government Republicans Hijacked the Conservative Cause". Book by Richard A. Viguerie, 2006.

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• Increased government spending can provide a temporary stimulus to demand and output but in the longer run higher levels of government spending crowd out private investment or require higher taxes that weaken growth by reducing incentives to save, invest, innovate, and work.

  Martin Feldstein

  Running, Government, Growth

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• Government is not a solution to our problem government is the problem.

  Ronald Reagan

  Freedom, Government, Problem

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• Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron.

  Dwight D. Eisenhower

  Peace, Children, Military

  Speech in Washington, 16 Apr. 1953, in Public Papers of Presidents 1953 (1960) p. 182

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• The same undisciplined government spending and social engineering that has undermined our economy over the past 30 years has also been tearing at the social fabric of this land.

  Stockwell Day

  Past, Government, Engineering

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• Since taking office, President Obama has signed into law spending increases of nearly 25 percent for domestic government agencies - an 84 percent increase when you include the failed stimulus. All of this new government spending was sold as 'investment.'

  Paul Ryan

  Agency, Government, Law

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• ..either immediately or ultimately every dollar of government spending must be raised through a dollar of taxation. Once we look at the matter. In this way, the supposed miracles of government spending will appear in another light.

  Henry Hazlitt

  Light, Government, Miracle

  Henry Hazlitt (2010). “Economics in One Lesson: The Shortest and Surest Way to Understand Basic Economics”, p.27, Crown Business

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• The idea that more taxes and more government spending is the best way to help hardworking middle class taxpayers - that's an old idea that's failed every time it's been tried.

  Marco Rubio

  Government, Class, Ideas

  "FULL TEXT: Marco Rubio's Response To Obama's State Of The Union" by Grace Wyler, www.businessinsider.com. February 12, 2013.

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• We don't need more politicians insisting we have deficits because you're not taxed enough. Those deficits ballooned from an economy that didn't grow enough and from 50 years of government spending too much.

  Ronald Reagan

  Government, Years, Too Much

  United States. President (1981-1989 : Reagan), Ronald Reagan (1982). “Ronald Reagan”

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• [T]he more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer . . . [taking] away from before their eyes the greatest of all inducements to industry, frugality, and sobriety, by giving them a dependence of somewhat else than a careful accumulation during youth and health for support in age and sickness.

  Benjamin Franklin

  Eye, Government, Giving

  Benjamin Franklin (1835). “The Works of Benjamin Franklin”, p.221

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• I regret, as much as any member, the unavoidable weight and duration of the burdens to be imposed; having never been a proselyte to the doctrine, that public debts are public benefits. I consider them, on the contrary, as evils which ought to be removed as fast as honor and justice will permit.

  James Madison

  Regret, Government, Evil

  James Madison (1904). “The Writings of James Madison: 1787-1790”

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• I favor the policy of economy, not because I wish to save money, but because I wish to save people. The men and women of this country who toil are the ones who bear the cost of the Government. Every dollar that we carelessly waste means that their life will be so much the more meager. Every dollar that we save means that their life will be so much the more abundant. Economy is idealism in its most practical form.

  Calvin Coolidge

  Country, Mean, Men

  Presidential Inaugural Address, delivered 4 March 1925

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• To win elections, politicians have promised practically endless government spending and covered up the cost, leaving generations of taxpayers obligated to pay off the debt. That's wrong, but neither the U.S. nor Europe has a plan to stop it.

  David Malpass

  Winning, Government, Covered Up

  "And the Crisis Winner Is? Government". "The Wall Street Journal", December 16, 2011.

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