{"quotes":[{"text":"It might seem to you that living in the woods on a riverbank would remove you from the modern world. But not if the river is navigable, as ours is. On pretty weekends in the summer, this riverbank is the very verge of the modern world. It is a seat in the front row, you might say. On those weekends, the river is disquieted from morning to night by people resting from their work.This resting involves traveling at great speed, first on the road and then on the river. The people are in an emergency to relax. They long for the peace and quiet of the great outdoors. Their eyes are hungry for the scenes of nature. They go very fast in their boats. They stir the river like a spoon in a cup of coffee. They play their radios loud enough to hear above the noise of their motors. They look neither left nor right. They don't slow down for - or maybe even see - an old man in a rowboat raising his lines...I watch and I wonder and I think. I think of the old slavery, and of the way The Economy has now improved upon it. The new slavery has improved upon the old by giving the new slaves the illusion that they are free. The Economy does not take people's freedom by force, which would be against its principles, for it is very humane. It buys their freedom, pays for it, and then persuades its money back again with shoddy goods and the promise of freedom.","author":"Wendell Berry","tags":["economy","freedom","irony","modernity","rest","restlessness","slavery"],"id":767,"author_id":"Wendell+Berry"},{"text":"A National Government cannot create good times. It cannot make the rain to fall, the sun to shine, or the crops to grow, but it can, by pursuing a meddlesome policy, attempting to change economic conditions, and frightening the investment of capital, prevent a prosperity and a revival of business which might otherwise have taken place.","author":"William Howard Taft","tags":["business","economy","government"],"id":11709,"author_id":"William+Howard+Taft"},{"text":"Rats and roaches live by competition under the law of supply and demand; it is the privilege of human beings to live under the laws of justice and mercy. It is impossible not to notice how little the proponents of the ideal of competition have to say about honesty, which is the fundamental economic virtue, and how very little they have to say about community, compassion, and mutual help.","author":"Wendell Berry","tags":["community","economy","justice"],"id":12076,"author_id":"Wendell+Berry"},{"text":"Savers have to be punished so debtors can be saved.Why? Because if debtors are rescued, that makes it possible for more debts to be issued in the future.And why is that important? Because the banking system needs ever more loans in order to survive.","author":"Chris Martenson","tags":["banking","banking-system","banks","corrupt","corruption","debt","debtor","economics","economy","finance","future","loans","money","politics","punish","punishment","rescue","save","savers","saving","savings"],"id":15350,"author_id":"Chris+Martenson"},{"text":"Emergencies have always been necessary to progress. It was darkness which produced the lamp. It was fog that produced the compass. It was hunger that drove us to exploration. And it took a depression to teach us the real value of a job.","author":"Victor Hugo","tags":["depression","economy","exploration","inspirational","progress"],"id":15774,"author_id":"Victor+Hugo"},{"text":"The conservatives are fools: They whine about the decay of traditional values, yet they enthusiastically support technological progress and economic growth. Apparently it never occurs to them that you can't make rapid, drastic changes in the technology and the economy of a society without causing rapid changes in all other aspects of the society as well, and that such rapid changes inevitably break down traditional values.","author":"Theodore J. Kaczynski","tags":["change","conservatism","conservative","culture","democrat","economy","inconsistency","individual","industrialization","liberal","popular-culture","progressivism","reform","republican","society","technology","tradition","traditional","traditional-values"],"id":15911,"author_id":"Theodore+J.+Kaczynski"},{"text":"Belonging to the working class is the economy’s punishment for those who did what they were told to do in class.","author":"Mokokoma Mokhonoana","tags":["economy","education","employee","employment","punishment","school","working-class"],"id":16076,"author_id":"Mokokoma+Mokhonoana"},{"text":"Most of us fear change. Even when our minds say change is normal, our stomachs quiver at the prospect. But for strategists and managers today, there is no choice but to change.","author":"Robert Waterman","tags":["change","economy","enterprises","management","strategic-planning","strategy","transformation"],"id":17109,"author_id":"Robert+Waterman"},{"text":"Some would blame our current problems on an organized conspiracy. I wish it were so simple. Members of a conspiracy can be rooted out and brought to justice. This system, however, is fueled by something far more dangerous than conspiracy. It is driven not by a small band of men but by a concept that has become accepted as gospel: the idea that all economic growth benefits humankind and that the greater the growth, the more widespread the benefits. This belief also has a corollary: that those people who excel at stoking the fires of economic growth should be exalted and rewarded, while those born at the fringes are available for exploitation.","author":"John Perkins","tags":["economy","terrorism"],"id":17614,"author_id":"John+Perkins"},{"text":"They cannot see that growth for the sake of growth is a cancerous madness, that Phoenix and Albuquerque will not be better cities to live in when their populations are doubled again and again. They would never understand that an economic system which can only expand or expire must be false to all that is human.","author":"Edward Abbey","tags":["arizona","capitalism","economy","new-mexico"],"id":18814,"author_id":"Edward+Abbey"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":304,"pages":31,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}