John Caudwell Quotes

Government is just spending too much money.

To date, every American citizen has nearly $27,000 in public debt riding on our backs.

Besides, we had a large debt, contracted at home and abroad in our War of Independence; therefore the great power of taxation was conferred upon this Government.

A public debt is a public curse and in a representative government greater than any other.

When the fountains of government [borrowing] abundance began to dry up, when through lack of funds and the impossibility of negotiating fresh loans the state was forced to check the extension of bureaucracy and to put a stop to public works, then and then only did the Italians realize what it meant to have allowed themselves to be made one of the most heavily taxed nations in the world.

Either we pay the government's bills, or we leave them for our kids to pay. It's that simple.

What does it mean when Republicans and Democrats alike warn us about the 'pain' involved in cutting government spending - in their spending less of our money? For the average citizen, what pain is there in his keeping more of his money to invest it the way he wants? Taxes cost people. Tax cuts do not cost government.

The federal government now spends one of every four dollars in the entire economy. It borrows one of every three dollars it spends. No nation, no entity, large or small, public or private, can thrive, or survive intact, with debts as huge as ours.

We have to deal with two issues. Spending and taxes.

The government deficit is the difference between the amount of money the government spends and the amount it has the nerve to collect.

People don’t want Washington to grow faster than their ability to pay for it.

The appropriation of public money always is perfectly lovely until someone is asked to pay the bill.

Of all debts men are least willing to pay the taxes.

As an individual who undertakes to live by borrowing, soon finds his original means devoured by interest, and next no one left to borrow from—so it must be with a government.

Who can pretend that commercial imposts are, or would be, alone equal to the present and future exigencies of the Union?

Between debt and taxes Americans had usually chosen debt.

The burden of the national debt consists not in its being so many millions, or so many hundred millions, but in the quantity of taxes collected every year to pay the interest. If this quantity continue the same, the burden of the national debt is the same to all intents and purposes, be the capital more or less.

What the federal government does basically is borrow money from people and mail it to people.

A national debt if it is not excessive will be to us a national blessing; it will be powerfull cement of our union. It will also create a necessity for keeping up taxation to a degree which without being oppressive, will be a spur to industry.

Basically, if you're a young Canadian now and Trudeau puts this country into $1.5 trillion in debt, you will never have the opportunity that I had as a young Canadian.

No animal on the face of the earth could conceive of taxation. You and I work roughly six months a year to pay our local, state and federal taxes. If nothing else, this should convince you that animals are smarter than people.

If the government can make money, what on earth does it collect taxes for you and me for? Why don't it make what money it wants, take the taxes out, and give the balance to us?

We can have tax cuts, but when we have tax cuts and do not have a surplus, the amount of the tax cut goes straight to the bottom line, adds to the deficit, and the deficit adds to the national debt, and sooner or later, the debt has to be paid.

It is day after day in this institution, borrow money, run up the debt, run up the deficits and then with a straight face say, we are going to repeal a tax that affects 1 percent of the American people, just 1 percent of the American people.

The power of collecting money from the people is not to be rejected because it has sometimes been oppressive. Public credit is as necessary for the prosperity of a nation as private credit is for the support and wealth of a family.