Explore Quotes by Robert J. Shiller

People aren't as impressed by homes anymore after they saw how they collapsed in price with the financial crisis.

I think we do need to try to not just rely on the central bank to, in its wisdom, adjust interest rates, but allow for people to avoid being exposed to inflation risk.

I think that a lot of people in all walks of life have the impression, of course, that, 'I specialize in something. I can't - I don't have the time to read other things. I'll just go to pure entertainment when I'm relaxing, and then I'll come back to my pure specialty.' That produces - that attitude produces idiot savants, unfortunately.

All taxes, except a 'lump-sum tax,' introduce distortions in the economy. But no government can impose a lump-sum tax - the same amount for everyone regardless of their income or expenditures - because it would fall heaviest on those with less income, and it would grind the poor, who might be unable to pay it at all.

Speculative markets have always been vulnerable to illusion. But seeing the folly in markets provides no clear advantage in forecasting outcomes, because changes in the force of the illusion are difficult to predict.

The future is always coming up with surprises for us, and the best way to insulate yourself from these surprises is to diversify.

My very first publication was an estimator - this was a statistical procedure - a kind of invention. My father got a patent and started a business; it wasn't successful, but maybe I have some of him in me.

When valuation confidence falls, it means that stock markets are perceived as overpriced.

Trump has never been clear and consistent about what he will do as president.

We judge economics by what it can produce. As such, economics is rather more like engineering than physics: more practical than spiritual.

Trump does magic. Maybe it will be black magic sometime, but he's an amazing phenomenon.

Finance is not merely about making money. It's about achieving our deep goals and protecting the fruits of our labor. It's about stewardship and, therefore, about achieving the good society.

As I write in 2012 we certainly do not believe that it is over yet, and the worst may be yet to come. Efforts by governments to solve the underlying problems responsible for the crisis have still not gotten very far, and the 'stress tests' that governments have used to encourage optimism about our financial institutions were of questionable thoroughness.

I am worried that the collapse of home prices might turn out to be the most severe since the Great Depression.

It amazes me how people are often more willing to act based on little or no data than to use data that is a challenge to assemble.

Economists who adhere to rational-expectations models of the world will never admit it, but a lot of what happens in markets is driven by pure stupidity - or, rather, inattention, misinformation about fundamentals, and an exaggerated focus on currently circulating stories.

Economics is (now) about emotion and psychology.

The ability to focus attention on important things is a defining characteristic of intelligence.