Robert Reich Quotes

The delicate and intricate pattern of competition and cooperation in the economic behavior of the hundreds of thousands of citizens of Stockholm offers a challenge to the economist that is perhaps as complex as the challenges of the physicist and the chemist.

It has been shown that, in contrast to everything which classical national economy has hitherto taught, not the producer but the consumer is the ruling factor in economic life.

Those underlings who in all the preceding ages of history had formed the herds of slaves and serfs, of paupers and beggars, became the buying public, for whose favor the businessmen canvass. They are the customers who are “always right,” the patrons who have the power to make poor suppliers rich and rich suppliers poor.

Markets are really people.

The market and the consumer and idea trump the system.

It is a fact worth pondering that four centuries ago the evil of "an abundance or surplus" arose from its being kept off the market, while today the evil of surplus lies in its being thrown upon the market.

The thing about markets, and I think the thing people don't understand about that, is markets are not kind, but they're very efficient. So when the marketplace determines an inefficiency in the system, it corrects that, and a market system that's left alone will reward good behavior and punish bad behavior.

And this thesis is somewhat connected with general social and political observations, because it establishes the fact that the number of consumers is considerably larger than the number of producers, a fact which exercises a not inconsiderable social and political pressure.

My instinct is to assume that we consumers are an inconsistent bunch. We like competition if it delivers low prices, but grumble if it delivers the bad news that prices need to go up.

If consumers make better choices, the marketplace will change.

Products are valued higher than services.

I've always believed that competition is good for consumers and good for businesses.

I love the way capitalism finds a place - even for its enemies.

I think we all realize the consumer has taken control, and they're not giving it back. So as every new technology comes forward, we have to figure out how to integrate it.

Critics of consumer capitalism like to think that consumers are manipulated and controlled by those who seek to sell them things, but for the most part it's the other way around: companies must make what consumers want and deliver it at the lowest possible price.

It used to be that people needed products to survive. Now products need people to survive.

Supply always comes on the heels of demand.

The difficulty lies, not in finding a producer, but in finding a consumer.

The cold, commercial word 'market' disguises its human character - a market is a collection of our aspirations, exertions, choices and desires.

The pharma pricing system was not built on the idea of consumer engagement. It was built... on market efficiencies. It was not built on the premise of consumerism.

You have to follow the consumer, and the consumer will be in control.

When you offer consumers choice, let them vote with their wallets.

There are probably no more market-oriented individuals on the planet, than low income people.

Free markets select for winning solutions.

Economics played a role. Raleighs have gone from six fifty to nine dollars a carton, but there's a three-quarter cent coupon on the back. You can get all kinds of things with them, blenders, everything. I saved up enough one time and got Al Bumbry.