Look around, and you see everywhere the exertions and acts of individuals restricted, regulated, or promoted, on the principle of the common welfare.
Friedrich ListRead
Industry entirely left to itself, would soon fall to ruin, and a nation letting everything alone would commit suicide.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the importance of governmental oversight in industry to prevent decline and promote growth.
Friedrich List's quote suggests that without regulation and support, industries would struggle to thrive and could collapse. By stating that a nation allowing complete freedom to industry would be committing suicide, he highlights the need for a balanced approach where government plays a crucial role in guiding and sustaining economic development for the greater good of society.
Themes
IndustryGovernmentRegulationEconomyDevelopment
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about economic policy, a politician might reference this quote to advocate for more government involvement in business.
More from Friedrich List
All quotes βIt is bad policy to regulate everything... where things may better regulate themselves and can be better promoted by private exertions; but it is no less bad policy to let those things alone which can only be promoted by interfering social power.
Friedrich ListRead
An individual, in promoting his own interest, may injure the public interest; a nation, in promoting the general welfare, may check the interest of a part of its members.
Friedrich ListRead
Similar quotes
If they are too big to fail, make them smaller.
George P. ShultzRead
Inflation is the fiscal complement of statism and arbitrary government. It is a cog in the complex of policies and institutions which gradually lead toward totalitarianism .
Ludwig Von MisesRead
One of the market's virtues, and the reason it enables so much peaceful interaction and cooperation among such a great variety of peoples, is that it demands of its participants only that they observe a relatively few basic principles, among them honesty, the sanctity of contracts, and respect for private property.
Thomas WoodsRead
All money is a matter of belief.
Adam SmithRead
When inequality gets too extreme, then it becomes useless for growth, and it can even become bad because it tends to lead to high perpetuation of inequality over time and low mobility.
Thomas PikettyRead
European officials thought that austerity was part of what they called their 'convergence policies,' of trying to bring countries together. Instead, it actually made things worse. There's more inequality within countries and more disparity across countries.
Joseph StiglitzRead