James Forrestal Quotes

The government assistance to the automobile industry was a tremendous success. The American auto industry was saved. Workers kept their jobs. The auto companies all have paid back their loans and they are all now profitable. If we had lost the auto industry, the industrial backbone of the country would have been destroyed. Steel, glass, rubber all would have collapsed.

My mission is to put France back on its feet. The priority is employment. Efforts have to be made, but those efforts must be made fairly.

The extension and expansion of the payroll tax holidays for workers would be number one on my list and key to avoiding recession.

The tax relief package enacted in 2001 was central to pulling the economy out of the post 9-11 recession. It's the reason we've got low unemployment and have created more than two million jobs in the last year.

I believe - I'm not a political expert, but I believe there is a broad consensus, a middle ground if you will, that Democrats and Republicans, business people and workers can agree on, to get this - the economy growing faster, getting people back to work.

We can support Barack Obama because he's committed to putting America back to work with good jobs - and he proved it by saving the auto industry.

For the only way in which a durable peace can be created is by world-wide restoration of economic activity and international trade.

Before Barack Obama took office, it looked like that pride could have vanished forever, but today, from the staggering depths of the Great Recession, the nation has had 29 straight months of job growth. Workers across my state and across the country are getting back the dignity of a good job and a good salary.

The rest of the world needs the US economy and financial system to recover in order for it to revive. We remain at the center of global economic activity with financial and trade ties to every region of the globe.

After the First World War the economic problem was no longer one of production. It was the problem of finding markets to get the output of industry and agriculture dispersed and consumed.

I think the big thing is to talk about getting people working again and addressing the issues that are keeping small business from being able to grow.

Well, I think the global economy is in the position for continuing good growth with inflation well in check.

The sooner we rein in the red tape factory in Washington, D.C., the sooner small businesses can get back to creating jobs and helping more Americans find an honest day's work.

We're facing headwinds from Europe. Europe doing the right things here to stabilize their situation is important to our small businesses, our workers, the middle class here, and overall economy.

Every dollar of SNAP benefits generates $1.84 in the economy in terms of economic activity. If people are able to buy a little more in the grocery store, someone has to stock it, package it, shelve it, process it, ship it. All of those are jobs. It's the most direct stimulus you can get in the economy during these tough times.

Our workers, our American people who are already struggling, are going to continue to struggle until we can get somebody who can bring some business sense to Washington D.C., and I think that is the one thing I bring.

If there are not sufficient jobs to go around then government must create jobs to give everyone an opportunity

I shall continue to regard it as my duty to use whatever means may be necessary to supplement State, local, and private agencies for the relief of suffering caused by unemployment. With respect to this question, I have recognized the dangers inherent in the direct giving of relief and have sought the means to provide not mere relief by the opportunity for useful and remunerative work. We shall, in the process of recovery, seek to move as rapidly as possible from direct relief to publicly supported work, and from that to the rapid restoration of private employment.

To those who say that our expenditures for Public Works and other means for recovery are a waste that we cannot afford, I answer that no country, however rich, can afford the waste of its human resources. Demoralization caused by vast unemployment is our greatest extravagance. Morally, it is the greatest menace to our social order.

The Congress also passed legislation authorizing the sale of beer in such states as desired. This has already resulted in considerable reemployment and, incidentally, has provided much needed tax revenue.

Our greatest primary task is to put people to work. This is no unsolvable problem if we face it wisely and courageously. It can be accomplished in part by direct recruiting by the Government itself, treating the task as we would treat the emergency of a war, but at the same time, through this employment, accomplishing greatly needed projects to stimulate and reorganize the use of our natural resources.

The first duty of this government is to give the workers work.

The United States should adopt a protective tariff of such a character as will help the struggling industries of Europe to get on their feet.

Our foreign trade provides more direct employment in the U.S. than the combined total of the textile industry including wearing apparel, the auto industry, the chemical industry and the steel industry. It is true, of course, that some harm is done by foreign trade to our small industries, particularly where certain competitive goods come into our country from nations where cheap labor is available. Yet we must recognize that it would be a mistake to do away with the exchange of goods and services which keep so many people employed. There is no doubt that at this point there is very much greater need for pushing the whole program of the International Labor Organization. The sooner labor costs can be brought into closer relationship in the various countries of the world, the better it will be for our own trade situation.

The cozy world we were told would go on forever, where full employment would be guaranteed by a stroke of the Chancellor’s pen, cutting taxes, deficit spending—that cozy world is gone.