Robert Reich Quotes

I was poor. When you're poor you work, and when you're rich you expect somebody to hand it to you. So I think being reasonably poor is very good for people.

It isn't the rich people's fault that poor people are poor. Poor people who get an education and work hard in this country will stop being poor. That should be the goal for all poor people everywhere.

I believe in the dignity of labor, whether with head or hand; that the world owes no man a living but that it owes every man an opportunity to make a living.

This is the greatest country in the world for people who want to work, but we have to make sure that this is always true..

When people listen to Jay-Z, they're working all day or trying to work and pay their bills, and what they hear is someone who's free. Who doesn't have to worry about the electricity. But all we're taught is that those who are rich deserve to be rich because they worked harder than the rest of us, or they're smarter.

People ask me, 'Why don't you take time off?' but the working class doesn't take time off. They're out there working every day. That's what I do, too. I want them to know there is hope, and I'm out there just like they are.

It's hard to do it because you gotta look people in the eye and tell 'em they're irresponsible and lazy. And who's gonna wanna do that? Because that's what poverty is, ladies and gentlemen. In this country, you can succeed if you get educated and work hard. Period. Period.

My mother, who graduated from high school at sixteen, had no hope of affording college, so she went to work in the local post office for a dollar a day. She was doing better than her father, who earned ten cents an hour working at a nearby grain elevator.

The Right insists that anyone can escape poverty by working hard but that is simply not the case.

I don't mind the rich getting richer, but the poor shouldn't be getting poorer, and there should be more people moving into the middle class.

I think most of us would agree that people who have, say, little formal schooling but labor honestly and diligently to help feed, clothe, and educate their families are deserving of greater respect - and help, if necessary - than many people who are superficially more successful.

People like me who grew up in a working-class town, who don't have a college education, you don't usually hear from us.

We were no experts in the field of labor organization, but we had something in common with our fellow workers -- we were all poor -- we were all overworked -- we were all victims of the 84 hour week. In fact, we were all so low down on the economic and social ladder that we had nowhere to go but up

The whole contention lies between those that labor for a living and those that do not.

If you are poor today, you will always be poor. Only the rich now acquire riches.

I do not accept the fact that a person should be poor if he works very hard.

I'm not running from the left; I'm running from the bottom. I'm running in fierce advocacy for working-class New Yorkers.

All the poor white people, all the poor black people, all the Hispanics, they're in the same boat. They've got no economic opportunities.

My father grew up with no money. He was raised in one of the poorest neighbourhoods in the U.S. My mother helped him sew labels into his ties. My life has been very comfortable, sure, but they instilled into us the importance of the work ethic.

I was one of the poorest people in America.

California Democrats are out to kill the American dream by ridiculing the commitment to hard work.

If you’re still poor at 35, you deserve it.

I never met a poor person who wanted to soak the rich; they want to get rich.

I'm from a working-class background, and I've experienced that worry of not having a job next week because the unions are going on strike. I know that because I don't come from a wealthy background.

I feel sympathy for the working class lad. I've always championed about ticket prices and try to equate that to people's salaries.