Quotes by Paul Krugman

“Politics determines who has the power, not who has the truth.”

“Political figures who talk a lot about liberty and freedom invariably turn out to mean the freedom to not pay taxes and discriminate based on race; freedom to hold different ideas and express them,...”

“I believe in a relatively equal society, supported by institutions that limit extremes of wealth and poverty. I believe in democracy, civil liberties, and the rule of law. That makes me a liberal, ...”

“These are tough times for state governments. Huge deficits loom almost everywhere, from California to New York, from New Jersey to Texas.WaitTexas? Wasn't Texas supposed to be thriving even as the ...”

“The media are desperately afraid of being accused of bias. And that's partly because there's a whole machine out there, an organized attempt to accuse them of bias whenever they say anything that t...”

“[Conventional wisdom] very heavily tends to reflect the preferences and the interests of the elite.”

“The appeal to the intellectually insecure is also more important than it might seem. Because economics touches so much of life, everyone wants to have an opinion. Yet the kind of economics covered ...”

“Some people want the past repeated and have an interest in making sure we don't remember it.”

“Now, its true that some of the protesters are oddly dressed or have silly-sounding slogans, which is inevitable given the open character of the events. But so what? I, at least, am a lot more offen...”

“Programmers have a saying: "garbage in, garbage out.”

“And that's just the beginning. More and more, conventional wisdom says that the responsible thing is to make the unemployed suffer. And while the benefits from inflicting pain are an illusion, the ...”

“The science fiction world has a lot of people doing seriously imaginative thinking.”

“The problem isn't that people don't understand how good things are. It's that they know, from personal experience, that things really aren't that good.”

“I think so long as fossil fuels are cheap, people will use them and it will postpone a movement towards new technologies.”

“[W]hat possible purpose does this lashing-out serve? Will activists be shamed into recovering their previous enthusiasm? Will Republicans stop their vicious attacks because Obama is lashing out to ...”

“Now, it’s true that some of the protesters are oddly dressed or have silly-sounding slogans, which is inevitable given the open character of the events. But so what? I, at least, am a lot more offe...”

“If there were an Economist's Creed, it would surely contain the affirmations 'I understand the Principle of Comparative Advantage' and 'I advocate Free Trade'”

“If there is one single area of economics in which path dependence is unmistakable, it is in economic geography – the location of production in space.”

“In the course of describing my formative moment in 1978, I have already implicitly given my four basic rules for research. Let me now state them explicitly, then explain. Here are the rules:1. List...”

“I do not mean to say that formal economic analysis is worthless, and that anybody's opinion on economic matters is as good as anyone else's. On the contrary! I am a strong believer in the importanc...”