The biggest and most deadly ‚tax‘ rate on the poor comes from a loss of various welfare state benefits – food stamps, housing subsidies and the like – if their income goes up.

Social Security is based on a principle. It’s based on the principle that you care about other people. You care whether the widow across town, a disabled widow, is going to be able to have food to eat.

In my youth, I traveled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.

I grew up in an era of pretty severe poverty. My parents weathered the Great Depression, and money was always a very big concern. I was weaned on a shortage mentality and placed in foster homes largely because there simply wasn’t enough money to take care of the most basic of needs.

If you go back to 1800, everybody was poor. I mean everybody. The Industrial Revolution kicked in, and a lot of countries benefited, but by no means everyone.

George Bush doesn’t care about black people.

The common argument that crime is caused by poverty is a kind of slander on the poor.

The fact is that ours is the first generation that can look disease and extreme poverty in the eye, look across the ocean to Africa, and say this, and mean it. We do not have to stand for this. A whole continent written off – we do not have to stand for this.

The pace at which people are taking to digital technology defies our stereotypes of age, education, language and income.

To be idle and to be poor have always been reproaches, and therefore every man endeavors with his utmost care to hide his poverty from others, and his idleness from himself.

I cannot possibly believe that I have it made while so many black brothers and sisters are hungry, inadequately housed, insufficiently clothed, denied their dignity as they live in slums or barely exist on welfare.

The distinguishing sign of slavery is to have a price, and to be bought for it.

Infinites, when considered absolutely without any restriction or limitation, are neither equal nor unequal, nor have any certain proportion one to another, and therefore, the principle that all infinites are equal is a precarious one.

The poorest people are the sweetest people.

One good thing about acting in film is that it’s good therapy.

Ridiculous yachts and private planes and big limousines won’t make people enjoy life more, and it sends out terrible messages to the people who work for them. It would be so much better if that money was spent in Africa – and it’s about getting a balance.

It put our energies to sleep and made visionaries of us – dreamers and indolent… It is good to begin life poor; it is good to begin life rich – these are wholesome; but to begin it prospectively rich! The man who has not experienced it cannot imagine the curse of it.

Sub-Saharan Africa is also home to 400 million of the world’s poorest people.

Poverty wants some, luxury many, and avarice all things.

The people are hungry: It is because those in authority eat up too much in taxes.

Without frugality none can be rich, and with it very few would be poor.

When I was young, poverty was so common that we didn’t know it had a name.

Wars of nations are fought to change maps. But wars of poverty are fought to map change.

Poverty is a veil that obscures the face of greatness. An appeal is a mask covering the face of tribulation.

Poverty must not be a bar to learning and learning must offer an escape from poverty.

Welfare’s purpose should be to eliminate, as far as possible, the need for its own existence.

Giving a poor person money keeps them poor.

If you are poor, you are not likely to live long.

Imagine a political system so radical as to promise to move more of the poorest 20% of the population into the richest 20% than remain in the poorest bracket within the decade? You don’t need to imagine it. It’s called the United States of America.

I think it’s brought the world a lot closer together, and will continue to do that. There are downsides to everything; there are unintended consequences to everything. The most corrosive piece of technology that I’ve ever seen is called television – but then, again, television, at its best, is magnificent.

Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody, I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person who has nothing to eat.

The most impactful dollars that Australia can spend are actually what goes to help the poorest.

Poverty is the worst form of violence.

If investments in banks fall, it is a tragedy, and people say, ‚What are we going to do?‘ but if people die of hunger, have nothing to eat or suffer from poor health, that’s nothing.

Lack of money is the root of all evil.

Trouble brews when we steal from the poor and give to the rich.

More than 820 million people in the world suffer from hunger; and 790 million of them live in the Third World.

Life in general has never been even close to fair, so the pretense that the government can make it fair is a valuable and inexhaustible asset to politicians who want to expand government.

The problem with being an employee or self-employed is you pay the highest taxes.

Severities should be dealt out all at once, so that their suddenness may give less offense; benefits ought to be handed ought drop by drop, so that they may be relished the more.

In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of.

There is a soak-the-rich attitude in the air, a feeling that if you have a lot of money you must have got it by some ghastly means. I can quite happily say there was never any family money. All the money we got was mine, just from writing books.

Some people think luxury is the opposite of poverty. It is not. It is the opposite of vulgarity.

The lack of money is the root of all evil.

You can only choose between rich and poor. The middle class is gone.

The first decade of the twentieth century was not a great time to be born black and poor and female in St. Louis, Missouri, but Vivian Baxter was born black and poor, to black and poor parents. Later she would grow up and be called beautiful. As a grown woman she would be known as the butter-colored lady with the blowback hair.

White people just don’t want their slaves to be free. That’s the whole thing.

The belief that the world is getting worse, that we can’t solve extreme poverty and disease, isn’t just mistaken. It is harmful.

Who, being loved, is poor?

Cannot people realize how large an income is thrift?

The surest way to remain poor is to be an honest man.

Satan is wiser now than before, and tempts by making rich instead of poor.

Throughout history, people have studied pure science from a desire to understand the universe rather than practical applications for commercial gain. But their discoveries later turned out to have great practical benefits.

Investing for the poor requires participation from the entire community.

Men feel that cruelty to the poor is a kind of cruelty to animals. They never feel that it is an injustice to equals; nay it is treachery to comrades.

The real minimum wage is zero.

You do not examine legislation in the light of the benefits it will convey if properly administered, but in the light of the wrongs it would do and the harms it would cause if improperly administered.

Capitalism has proven to be the only system that works, but the problem with capitalism is that extreme wealth ends up in the hands of a few people.

When I was a child, I was very poor and wanted everything. So when I got money, I began buying things.

Value is what you get.

Almost half of the population of the world lives in rural regions and mostly in a state of poverty. Such inequalities in human development have been one of the primary reasons for unrest and, in some parts of the world, even violence.