No one who can rise before dawn three hundred sixty days a year fails to make his family rich.
Malcolm GladwellRead
What does it say about a society that it devotes more care and patience to the selection of those who handle its money than of those who handle its children?
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote critiques societal priorities, emphasizing the contrasting standards applied to financial handlers versus caregivers of children.
Malcolm Gladwell's quote highlights a significant concern about societal values and priorities, suggesting that it is troubling when greater attention and scrutiny are given to those managing money than to those responsible for raising and nurturing children. This disparity reflects deeper issues regarding the worth placed on financial security compared to the fundamental role of childrearing, prompting us to reconsider what we deem important in our society.
Themes
SocietyChildrenValuesCareMoney
In practice
Example use cases
During a panel discussion on educational reforms, this quote can be used to emphasize the importance of investing in child welfare.
More from Malcolm Gladwell
All quotes →People are in one of two states in a relationship,” Gottman went on. “The first is what I call positive sentiment override, where positive emotion overrides irritability. It’s like a buffer. Their spouse will do something bad, and they’ll say, ‘Oh, he’s just in a crummy mood.’ Or they can be in negative sentiment override, so that even a relatively neutral thing that a partner says gets perceived as negative.
Malcolm GladwellRead
The people at the top don't work just harder or even much harder than everyone else. They work much, much harder.
Malcolm GladwellRead
Achievement is talent plus preparation. The problem with this view is that the closer psychologists look at the careers of the gifted, the smaller the role innate talent seems to play and the bigger the role preparation seems to play.
Malcolm GladwellRead
When I go to my health club, and it's in the basement, you have to take the elevator down. And this drives me crazy. Why can't there be a stairway? At least make it as easy to exercise as it is to not exercise. It's in society's interest for me to take the stairs.
Malcolm GladwellRead
Hard work is a prison sentence only if it does not have meaning.
Malcolm GladwellRead
Similar quotes
Of all the things that oppress me, this sense of the evil working of nature herself -my disgust at her barbarity -clumsiness -darkness -bitter mockery of herself -is the most desolating.
John RuskinRead
Philosophers there are who try to make themselves believe that this life is happy; but they believe it only while they are saying it, and never yet produced conviction in a single mind.
Samuel JohnsonRead
A shocking crime was committed on the unscrupulous initiative of few individuals, with the blessing of more, and amid the passive acquiescence of all.
TacitusRead
To be sure I must; and therefore I may assume that your silence gives consent.
PlatoRead
No salvation without regeneration - no spiritual life without a new birth - no heaven without a new heart.
J. C. RyleRead
He learned that when people are very poor they still have something to give and the impulse to give it.
John SteinbeckRead