Lewis H. Lapham Quotes

An imbalance between the rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.

Oligarchy is to the advantage of the rich. Democracy to the advantage of the poor.

Growing richer every day, for as rich and poor are relative terms, when the rich are growing poor, it is pretty much the same as if the poor were growing rich. Nobody is poor when the distinction between rich and poor is destroyed.

I believe and I say it is true Democratic feeling, that all the measures of the Government are directed to the purpose of making the rich richer and the poor poorer.

The forces in a capitalist society, if left unchecked, tend to make the rich richer and the poor poorer.

The rich rules over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender

Republicans look after the rich, and Democrats focus on the needs of the middle class. Neither of them looks after the poor.

The poor generally follow behavior patterns established by the rich.

We are undemocratic, then, in our religion, as is proved by our efforts to “raise” the poor.

Two nations between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy; who are as ignorant of each other's habits, thoughts and feelings, as if they were dwellers in different zones or inhabitants of different planets ... the rich and the poor.

There are no great lords who possess everything and a herd of people who have nothing

This contempt for money is a trick developed by the rich to keep the poor without it.

God help the rich, the poor can look after themselves

Since the poor don’t vote, and the rich are too few to mention, the middle class chooses all by itself who runs the country.

Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.

The rich stick together; the poor and the marginalised are thrown together.

You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.

The rich don't exploit the poor. They just out-compete them.

I think greed is a critical problem - the gap between the poor and the rich. The gap between the top 10 percent and the bottom 10 percent.

Liberals are concerned about the concentration of wealth because it almost inevitably leads to a concentration of power that undermines democracy.

It's the rich you can terrorize. The poor have nothing to lose.

At the end of the day, we have an economy that works for the rich by cheating the poor, and unequal schools are the result of that, not the cause.

It seems that the fiction writer has a revolting attachment to the poor, for even when he writes about the rich, he is more concerned with what they lack than with what they have.

The only difference between the Democrats and the Republicans is that the Democrats allow the poor to be corrupt, too.

What the 'supposed 99 percent' don't realize is that they are better off if there are more fat cats, not less.