Benjamin Franklin Quote – Idleness and pride tax with …

Idleness and pride tax with a heavier hand than kings and parliaments. If we can get rid of the former, we may easily bear the latter.

- Benjamin Franklin¹

1. Letter on the Stamp Act, July 1, 1765, reported in Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Francis Bacon Quote – Riches are a good handmaid …

Riches are a good handmaid, but the worst mistress.

- Francis Bacon¹

1. De Augmentis Scientiarum, Book II, Antitheta (1623)

Bernard Lietaer Quote – Money is created when banks …

Money is created when banks lend it into existence. When a bank provides you with a $100,000 mortgage, it creates only the principal, which you spend and which then circulates in the economy. The bank expects you to pay back $200,000 over the next 20 years, but it doesn’t create the second $100,000 – the interest. Instead, the bank sends you out into the tough world to battle against everybody else to bring back the second $100,000.

All the banks are doing the same thing when they lend money into existence. That is why the decisions made by central banks, like the Federal Reserve in the US, are so important – increased interest costs automatically determine a larger proportion of necessary bankruptcies.

So when the bank verifies your “creditworthiness,” it is really checking whether you are capable of competing and winning against other players – able to extract the second $100,000 that was never created. And if you fail in that game, you lose your house or whatever other collateral you had to put up.

- Bernard Lietaer¹

1. Beyond Greed and Scarcity in Yes! Magazine, Summer 1997

John Maynard Keynes Quote – The decadent international but individualistic …

The decadent international but individualistic capitalism in the hands of which we found ourselves after the war is not a success. It is not intelligent. It is not beautiful. It is not just. It is not virtuous. And it doesn’t deliver the goods.

- John Maynard Keynes¹

1. National self-sufficiency (1933) Section 3, republished in Collected Works Vol. 11 (1982).

Warren Buffett Quote – Someone’s sitting in the shade …

Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.

- Warren Buffett¹

1. “The New Establishment 50.” Vanity Fair, October, 1996, p. 280

William Boetcker Quote – The Ten Cantons

1. You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
2. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
3. You cannot help little men by tearing down big men.
4. You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
5. You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
6. You cannot establish sound security on borrowed money.
7. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
8. You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than you earn.
9. You cannot build character and courage by destroying men’s initiative and independence.
10. And you cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they can and should do for themselves.

- William J. H. Boetcker¹

1. As quoted from his Wikipedia article

Warren Buffett Quote – It’s easier to create money …

It’s easier to create money than to spend it.

- Warren Buffet¹

1. Linda Grant, “Striking Out at Wall Street,” U.S. News & World Report, June 20, 1994, p. 58

Bernard Lietaer Quote – While economic textbooks claim that …

While economic textbooks claim that people and corporations are competing for markets and resources, I claim that in reality they are competing for money – using markets and resources to do so. So designing new money systems really amounts to redesigning the target that orients much human effort.

Furthermore, I believe that greed and competition are not a result of immutable human temperament; I have come to the conclusion that greed and fear of scarcity are in fact being continuously created and amplified as a direct result of the kind of money we are using.

For example, we can produce more than enough food to feed everybody, and there is definitely enough work for everybody in the world, but there is clearly not enough money to pay for it all. The scarcity is in our national currencies. In fact, the job of central banks is to create and maintain that currency scarcity. The direct consequence is that we have to fight with each other in order to survive.

- Bernard Lietaer¹

1. Beyond Greed and Scarcity in Yes! Magazine, Summer 1997

Music Quote – Gwen Stefani ft. Eve – Rich Girls

If I was a Rich Girl
Na [x15]
See, I’d have all the money in the world, if I was a wealthy girl
No man could test me, impress me, my cash flow would never ever end
Cause I’d have all the money in the world, if I was a wealthy girl

Think what that money could bring
I’d buy everything
Clean out Vivienne Westwood
In my Galliano gown
No, wouldn’t just have one hood
A Hollywood mansion if I could
Please book me first class to my fancy house in London town

All the riches baby, won’t mean anything
All the riches baby, bring what your love can bring
All the riches baby, won’t mean anything
Don’t need no other baby
Your lovin’ is better than gold and I know

If I was rich girl (na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na nah)
See, I’d have all the money in the world, if I was a wealthy girl
No man could test me, impress me, my cash flow would never ever end
Cause I’d have all the money in the world, if I was a wealthy girl
I’d get me four Harajuku girls to
Inspire me and they’d come to my rescue
I’d dress them wicked, I’d give them names
Love, Angel, Music, Baby
Hurry up and come and save me

All the riches baby, won’t mean anything
All the riches baby, bring what your love can bring
All the riches baby, won’t mean anything
Don’t need no other baby
Your lovin’ is better than gold and I know

[EVE:]
Come together all over the world
From the hoods of japan Harajuku girls
What? It’s all love
What? Give it up
What?
(shouldn’t matter) [x4]
What?
Come together all over the world
From the hoods of japan Harajuku girls
What? It’s all the love
What? Give it up
What? (shouldn’t matter)
What happened to my life? Turned up side down
Chicks that blew ya mind, ding, it’s the second round
Original track ending
You know you can’t buy these things
See Stefani and her L.A.M.B I rock the fetish people you know who I am

[Eve and Stefani:]
Yes ma’am, we got the style that’s wicked
I hope you can all keep up
We climbed all the way from the bottom to the top
now we ain’t gettin’ nothing but love

If I was rich girl (na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na nah)
See, I’d have all the money in the world, if I was a wealthy girl
No man could test me, impress me, my cash flow would never ever end
Cause I’d have all the money in the world, if I was a wealthy girl

Warren Buffett Quote – To swim a fast 100 meters …

To swim a fast 100 meters, it’s better to swim with the tide than to work on your stroke.

- Warren Buffett¹

1. Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting, Omaha, 1991