At the simplest level, economics can better show us the consequences of our actions. Less simple are cases in which we don't have the knowledge to predict the full consequences. Global warming and climate change are examples.
Edmund PhelpsRead
What brought mass innovation to a nation was not scientific advances - its own or others' - but 'economic dynamism': the desire and the space to innovate.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The key to mass innovation in a nation lies not just in science, but in economic factors that encourage creativity and progress.
This quote by Edmund Phelps emphasizes that true innovation on a large scale is driven by an economic environment that fosters creativity and encourages individuals to come up with new ideas, rather than solely relying on scientific breakthroughs. It suggests that a nation's economic policies and cultural attitudes towards innovation play a crucial role in its ability to develop and implement new technologies and advancements.
Themes
InnovationEconomicsCreativityEconomic DynamismProgress
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about entrepreneurship, one might use this quote to highlight the importance of a supportive economic environment.
More from Edmund Phelps
All quotes βIf every effect of any new products or methods were required to be known before they could be produced and marketed, they would not be true innovations - and thus not represent new knowledge of what people would like, if offered.
Edmund PhelpsRead
The good life, as it is popularly conceived, typically involves acquiring mastery in one's work, thus gaining for oneself better terms - or means to rewards, whether material, like wealth, or nonmaterial - an experience we may call 'prospering.'
Edmund PhelpsRead
The epic story of the West is the development in the 19th century of a mass prosperity the world had never seen and its near-disappearance in one nation after another in the 20th.
Edmund PhelpsRead
Entrepreneurs have only the murkiest picture of the future in which they are making their bets, and also there is ambiguity: they don't know when they push this lever or that lever that the outcome is going to be what they think it is going to be - there is the law of unanticipated consequences.
Edmund PhelpsRead
When the word 'morality' comes up in connection with economics, income distribution and financial stability are usually the issues. Is it moral for rich countries to use such a high proportion of the world's resources or for investment bankers to earn large bonuses?
Edmund PhelpsRead
Similar quotes
There is only one difference between a bad economist and a good one: the bad economist confines himself to the visible effect; the good economist takes into account both the effect that can be seen and those effects that must be foreseen.
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There is a basic lesson on financial crises that governments tend to wait too long, underestimate the risks, want to do too little. And it ultimately gets away from them, and they end up spending more money, causing much more damage to the economy.
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By a continuing process of inflation, government can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens.
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The most insidious thing about trickle-down economics is not the claim that if the rich get richer, everyone is better off. It is the claim made by those who oppose any increase in the minimum wage that if the poor get richer, that will be bad for the economy. This is nonsense.
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Tax laws favor capital over labor, giving capital gains a lower rate than ordinary income. The rich get humongous mortgage interest deductions while renters get no deduction at all.
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Globalisation, for me, seems to be not first-order harm, and I find it very hard not to think about the billion people who have been dragged out of poverty as a result.
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