P. J. O'Rourke Quotes

In my experience, poor people are the world's greatest entrepreneurs. Every day, they must innovate in order to survive. They remain poor because they do not have the opportunities to turn their creativity into sustainable income.

When times are bad is when the real entrepreneurs emerge.

I've been fortunate to come on places where the question isn't why did I do it? The question to me is always, why didn't anybody else do it before me? Those are the ones that I scratch my head about.

The heart of the entrepreneur can beat freely in anyone.

American inventiveness and the desire to build developed because we were guaranteed the right to own our success.

A nation without dregs and malcontents is orderly, decent, peaceful and pleasant, but perhaps without the seeds of things to come.

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

Where else can a guy like me make it? Blind and poor---only in America.

The great mass of our poor white population begin to understand that they have rights, and that they, too, are entitled to some of the sympathy which falls upon the suffering. They are fast learning that there is an almost infinite world of industry opening before them, by which they can elevate themselves and their families from wretchedness and ignorance to competence and intelligence..

I've never had a business plan. Every project we've ever done was the intersection of somebody with a real need, a real passion to do something, and hustling.

Poverty will not be allowed to become a wall in the way of education.

My father was a brilliant inventor and businessman. He taught me to appreciate the opportunities that America offers to innovators.

Education is the key to opportunity. It's a ticket out of poverty.

Something I stand for is being brave enough to invest in creative ideas that I firmly believe in and bringing those to life.

Creativity and business acumen don't always go hand in hand.

America has always fascinated me; it's a country where you can make it from one side to the other with no money, by hook or by crook.

You have to be very brave and very entrepreneurial - you have to dare to create your own brand.

When I was an orphan, I was the richest kid at the orphanage because everyone else was complaining about not having anything. But when I discovered that you could get two cents for a Coca-Cola bottle, I would follow people around who were drinking it and ask them if they were almost through with it.

If you have one good idea, people will lend you twenty.

It is the creative and enterprising spirit of people that is indispensable. Everything else is supplemental.

When you meet someone with a vision, you have to give them a shot and an opportunity to see what they can do.

For over two centuries, Americans have grown up in a society that rewards hard work, protects innovation, and allows its citizens to constantly break new barriers. The key element to this success rests on freedom and the ability of individuals to strive toward achieving their dreams and making their children's futures better than their own.

I've developed a theory that there's an inverse relationship between money and imagination. That if you've got lots of imagination then you don't really need much money, and if you've got lots of money then you won't bother with much imagination.

Out of economic hardship can come change - we are suddenly cast onto our wits and our talents and our resources and our strengths, as we lose all the choices we once had.

If you have ideas, you have the main asset you need, and there isn't any limit to what you can do with your business and your life. Ideas are any man's greatest asset.