Irving Fisher

"The paradox of thrift is that individual prudence can lead to collective poverty."

"Markets are impersonal mechanisms for coordinating human desires and resources."

"The man who is afraid to take risks will never accumulate significant wealth."

"Economic justice requires both compassion and mathematics."

"The velocity of money is the heartbeat of economic vitality."

"To regulate business without understanding it is to invite disaster."

"The poor are not poor because others are rich but because they are unproductive."

"The quantity of money matters less than its quality and stability."

"A currency backed by nothing but faith is as fragile as faith itself."

"The economic future belongs not to the strongest nation but to the wisest."

"The man who cannot explain his financial position in writing does not truly understand it."

"Inflation and deflation are both diseases of the economic body."

"The purpose of economics is not to make men rich but to explain why some are and others are not."

"In the long run, economic forces are more powerful than any government decree."

"The distribution of wealth is determined by the distribution of knowledge."

"A stable currency is the prerequisite for a stable society."

"The economist is a prophet not of the future but of the inevitable consequences of present actions."

"Savings are not hoarded wealth but invested potential."

"The man who understands statistics understands reality; the man who misuses them creates illusions."

"Economic value is created through the transformation of natural resources by human ingenuity."

"The best defense against inflation is productive capacity."

"A nation that cannot produce more than it consumes is on a path to decline."

"The interest rate is the price at which the future is traded for the present."

"Men are not equal in talent but they should be equal in opportunity."

"The ledger book never lies; it merely records the consequences of our choices."

"To understand the circulation of money is to understand the circulation of life itself."

"Productivity is the only permanent source of wealth for a nation."

"The economist who ignores human nature will construct castles on sand."

"Capital accumulation is the result of deferred gratification multiplied by compound interest."

"The man who lives beyond his means lives in a prison of his own making."