Martin Feldstein Quotes

Instead of focusing on growing jobs and reigniting our economy, President Obama focused on growing government and tried to remake the United States into the image of the debt-laden countries of Europe. His approach has been more spending, more regulation, and higher taxes.

Obama sees everything backward. Where Americans see individual achievement, he sees government's work. Where we see failing companies, he sees innovation worth subsidizing. Where we see the need for economic growth, he sees a need for higher taxes.

Government does not create jobs, it only creates the conditions that make jobs more or less likely.

The truth of the matter of is that stimulus money not only doesn't stimulate; it actually reduces output.

I know it's going to be the private sector that leads this country out of the current economic times we're in. You can spend your money better than the government can spend your money.

The President and the Democrats on Congress have exploited the financial crisis to advance their socialist big government tax, spend and borrow agenda.

The government can't create jobs; they'll destroy jobs trying to do it. The government doesn't have any money; all they have is a printing press. We need to free markets to create jobs; if the government wants to help, they should reduce their burden on the economy.

Investing capital in the free market creates innovation, businesses, jobs and economic growth. Investing capital in the government creates more bureaucracy, more paperwork and inefficiency.

The economy grows when families can spend money on personal priorities rather than priorities imposed by the federal government.

Taxes aren't the way to go. They'd strangle the economy; you wouldn't create the wealth. And nothing squanders money as well as a government. What we need is to encourage rich people to give.

And taking more money out of the private economy and having the government perform as it has poorly done with the stimulus I don't think is the right way to go.

Well, the problem of the federal government is that they print money and go in debt. That's their national policy, Democrats and Republicans it doesn't matter. And this is where I differ.

The basic idea that if you increase government spending or you cut people's taxes that stimulates the economy and lowers the unemployment rate, is a very widely accepted idea. It's in every economics textbook, that's what we teach our undergraduates, and I certainly try to teach them the truth.

Make taxes as low as possible so entrepreneurs have incentive to work hard and be creative. The human mind is the secret to economic growth.

I spent my whole life in the private sector, 25 years in the private sector. I understand that when government takes more money out of the hands of people, it makes it more difficult for them to buy things. If they can't buy things, the economy doesn't grow. If the economy doesn't grow, we don't put Americans to work.

Every dollar the government doesn't spend, tax, or borrow is a dollar that businesses and families can spend or invest themselves.

When the government takes more money out of the pockets of middle class Americans, entrepreneurs, and businesses, it lessens the available cash flow for people to spend on goods and services, less money to start businesses, and less money for businesses to expand - i.e. creating new jobs and hiring people.

The only way government bureaucrats know of keeping prosperity going is to inflate some more - to increase the deficit or to pump more money into the system.

Any money the government spends must be taxed, borrowed or conjured out of thin air by the Federal Reserve, and that will reduce sound private investment. Obama has no real wealth to inject into the economy. He can only move around existing money while inflation robs us of purchasing power. Meanwhile, private investors who might have produced a better engine, battery, computer, cancer treatment or other wealth-creating and life-enhancing innovations hold back for fear that big government will undermine productive efforts.

People listen to me, and they hear about a government they want, a government... that will cut spending, cut taxes, that will focus on private-sector job creation.

The Republican promise is for policies that create economic growth. Republicans believe lower taxes, less regulation, balanced budgets, a solvent Social Security and Medicare will stimulate economic growth.

The federal government now spends one of every four dollars in the entire economy. It borrows one of every three dollars it spends. No nation, no entity, large or small, public or private, can thrive, or survive intact, with debts as huge as ours.

The foundations of a strong economy don't rest alone on the decisions of Chancellors or the spending programmes of government.

And so we have to be careful with looking at additional stimulus that we don't provoke an increase in the bond rate and then offset a lot of the stimulus we've already got.

The BBC is locked to the reading of the economy that is run out of Ed Miliband and Ed Balls' office. They think if only you spend and borrow more money you can create growth everywhere.