Nathaniel Smith Quotes

If you get so unequal that people believe they don't have a chance, that the field isn't level for them and their children, that puts democracy at risk.

As long as inheritance lasts, there will be hereditary economic inequality—not the natural inequality of individuals, but the artificial inequality of classes—which will necessarily continue to be expressed in hereditary inequality of the development and cultivation of intelligence and will remain the source and sanction of all political and social inequality.

I'm very keen that we have this debate about the good parts of inequality and the bad parts of inequality. It's not a one-sided thing.

What has destroyed every previous civilization has been the tendency to the unequal distribution of wealth and power.

When inequality gets too extreme, then it becomes useless for growth, and it can even become bad because it tends to lead to high perpetuation of inequality over time and low mobility.

I think one of the biggest mistakes that America has made - and maybe the world because this is, sort of, the core of communism and socialism - is that you can have perfect solutions to social problems like poverty, like crime. You're not going to eliminate all crime. Maybe you'll never eliminate all poverty.

No advance in wealth, no softening of manners, no reform or revolution has ever brought human equality a millimeter nearer.

There's great disparity between who goes to college and who goes to jail. Who lives long and who dies prematurely, is the defining issue of our time. And I submit to you, there's a significant race dimension, it is basically class-driven.

Massive inequality, we have learned, isn't the best way to run an economy after all. And when you think about it, it's also profoundly ugly.

In fact, the class divide in the black community is now seen by some as a permanent aspect of our existence.

I started out young and idealistic, and it was all about social justice and fair distribution of resources. I didn't understand why everybody couldn't be equally prosperous.

It's not my fault that there is this gap between rich and poor, it is the fault of governments. I want a different world. One where I don't wake up thinking I'm so lucky to be able to feed my daughter.

The association of poverty with progress is the enigma of our times.

Humanity can not be made equal by declarations on paper. Unless the material conditions for equality exist

The gap between aspiration and reality could hardly be wider. Today, the United States has less equality of opportunity than almost any other advanced industrial country. Study after study has exposed the myth that America is a land of opportunity. This is especially tragic: While Americans may differ on the desirability of equality of outcomes, there is near-universal consensus that inequality of opportunity is indefensible.

Inequality is an inevitable product of capitalist activity, and expanding equality of opportunity only increases it—because some individuals and communities are simply better able than others to exploit the opportunities for development and advancement that capitalism affords.

Clearly, there are persistent differences in our country.

It is true that globalization has fueled greater income inequality. But much of this increase should be welcomed, not condemned. There is nothing inherently bad about inequality. Whether it is bad depends on how it comes about and what it does.

I think, for me, the biggest issue is poverty in general, poverty in this time of plenty. It's reflected in homelessness. It's reflected in educational gaps. It's reflected in racial disparities.

There's always been a nasty strain of class prejudice ingrained in the condemnation of football's 'undeserving rich,' as if the working class is uniquely susceptible to being corrupted by money, and as if they deserve their wealth less than those born to it.

The majority decision constitutionalizes a distinction between a red leather pouch and a paper bag that is necessarily based at least in some part on economic and class differences and perceptions.

The difference between rich and poor", said Francie, "is that the poor do everything with thier own hands and the rich hire hands to do things.

There is no concept more generally cherished by publishers than that of the Undeserving Poor.

I think Republicans need to take income inequality more seriously. Not because I favor equality of outcomes. I do not. I think the Right is correct to stress merit and earned rewards, not handouts and forced equality. But I think what Republicans are blind to is that power corrupts.

Choice dependent on wealth; those are the Tory words.