Joseph R. Biden Jr. Quotes

Unless you’re at the very top, you need a more equitable economy.

Since I became First Minister, I have made clear my priority to alleviate poverty and tackle inequality in Scotland. Ensuring that everyone can do better in life will not only make Scotland fairer, but it will also make it a more prosperous place.

Workers in decent jobs view the economy as unjust if they or their children have virtually no chance of climbing to a higher rung in the socioeconomic ladder.

Those who work ought to live better than those that don't.

Our main task is not to see that people of great wealth add to it, but that those without much money have a greater chance to earn some.

We cannot run a democracy without a strong middle class.

You must not embark on programs to curb economic growth without placing a priority on maintaining income, so that the poorest people won’t simply be further depressed in their condition but will have a share, and be able to live decently.

A strong economy is perfectly consistent with concern for equity and economic justice.

The global economy should not be supported by wage earners. They have to be able to build a future like any other human being.

…it would be much better to enable every man to earn his own living, instead of being driven to the awful necessity of stealing and then dying for it.

There never can be equality of rewards or possessions so long as the human plan contains varied talents and differing degrees of industry and thrift, but ours ought to be a country free from the great blotches of distressed poverty.

Prohibiting Poverty

The battle to right the wrongs of income inequality is not – and cannot be – just a union issue. It is an issue for every American, union or non-union, white or of color, young or senior, straight or gay, income inequality is a battle for the very heart and soul of the nation.

Well, as you know, there are many things in life that are not fair, that wealthy people can afford and poor people can’t. But I don’t believe that the federal government should take action to try to make these opportunities exactly equal, when there is a moral factor involved.

Even as we continue to carry the banner of civil rights and environmental justice, we've also got to focus on many, many people - for them, life starts with a good job.

I am on the side of the working person across the country.

My goal is to eradicate poverty. I think we can't have equality until we eradicate poverty.

Education ought to be affordable for everybody. That only advances a society.

A man can be so busy making a living that he forgets to make a life.

The core strands of my involvement in public life are a belief in the need to strive wherever possible for equality of treatment and opportunity, to ensure all people have the means to a decent livelihood.

All privileges based on wealth, and all emnity to honest men merely because they are wealthy, are un-American.

How come you don't work fourteen hours a day? Your great-great-grandparents did. How come you only work the eight-hour day? Four guys got hanged fighting for the eight-hour day for you.

Government has the responsibility to provide the climate in which Americans, all Americans, have an opportunity for good jobs; and not only for good jobs, but an opportunity if they have the ability and the desire, to be owners and managers, to have a piece of the action, because if they have a piece of the action, then they believe in the system rather than fighting against it.

If the world is made to furnish each individual with the means of livelihood and the instruments for his growth and progress, each man has therefore the right to find in the world what is necessary for himself. The recent Council reminded us of this: "God intended the earth and all that it contains for the use of every human being and people. Thus, as all men follow justice and unite in charity, created goods should abound for them on a reasonable basis."

I knew that it is out of the question to have honest, economical government while a few are inordinately rich and the great mass of men are poor. In fact, it is to be doubted if anything really worthwhile can be done until there is a fairer distribution of wealth.