Alan Greenspan Quotes

The idea that free trade encourages global economic growth by enhancing productivity is taken as an article of faith by the three major schools of international political economy: liberalism, Marxism, and mercantilism

Free trade is the result of prosperity rather than the cause of prosperity .... Without growth over a long period of time you will not have a political commitment to free trade.

The free trade movement in the middle of the last century represents the first conscious recognition of these new circumstances and of the necessity to adapt to them.

Free trade has been one of the tenets of the modern Mexican economy, and it's through competition and free trade that we will continue to advance.

I'm quite an advocate of free trade.

Globalization and free trade do spur economic growth, and they lead to lower prices on many goods.

Global capitalism means that people are no longer confined by the decisions of national elites. These could be the local monopolies, the local powers, politicians, and so on. By making local powers compete or by bypassing them altogether, globalization gives people more freedom to decide.

Economies that are open to trade grow faster.

Global economic growth significantly increases with the growth of the world’s economic freedom.

Free trade economists have to explain how free trade can be an explanation for the economic success of today’s rich countries, when it simply had not been practiced very much before they became rich.

[Foreign] Trade is necessary to modern comfort and prosperity.

The prosperity created at home and overseas by free expansion [of foreign trade] was infinitely greater than could be coaxed by restrictive mercantilism.

We have to work towards free trade because otherwise we will miss out on many opportunities for cooperation, and relations amongst countries will become much more difficult.

Politicians of both parties told us that free trade with Asia and Latin America would spur economic growth, and maybe it did somewhere else. In our towns, though, factories continue shutting down or moving overseas.

Liberalized trade - in broadly multilateral, regional, or bilateral agreements - is a key ingredient in the recipe for prosperity... An absolute prerequisite for long-term economic growth is full participation in the global economy and trading system.

It was good to launch the economy in the '50s. Japan did this; China did this; even South Korea did this. All the East Asians did this - import substitution. I think all countries followed import substitution in the '50s and in the '60s, but I think by the '70s, countries were getting out of that first phase of the strategy.

That level of trade deficit throttles real growth in our country and continues the unfortunate path of selling out America. We are not winning the global trade war, we are losing it badly.

It's well proved economics that if a country which is rich and a country that is poor come together in global trade, sooner or later the standard of living of the poor country will go up towards that of the rich country.

But, we have had the debate in our country now for a number of years as to whether or not free trade agreements are good for economic growth and economic opportunity in creating jobs and lifting people out of poverty.

I'm a free market person, a free trader. But if we had a market in California, there would be competition.

The basic idea was that if a country would put its economy as an integrated piece of the world system, that it would benefit from that with economic growth. I concur with that basic view.

The increased global linkages promote economic growth in the world through two key mechanisms: the division of labor and the international spillovers of knowledge.

I certainly believe that we gain through open trade and liberalisation.

Few countries have become rich through free-trade, free-market policies, and few ever will.

In the broad and sweeping sense which the use of the term generally implies, I am not a free-trader.