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The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping the old ones, which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our minds.

John Maynard Keynes

It would not be foolish to contemplate the possibility of a far greater progress still.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Foolish Greatness Possible Progress
It has been pointed out already that no knowledge of probabilities, less in degree than certainty, helps us to know what conclusions are true, and that there is no direct relation between the truth of a proposition and its probability. Probability begins and ends with probability.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Direct Knowledge Point Probability True
The Economic Problem, the problem of want and poverty and the economic struggle between classes and nations, is nothing but a frightful muddle, a transitory and unnecessary muddle.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Economics Nation Necessary Poverty Problem Struggle
I think that Capitalism, wisely managed, can probably be made more efficient for attaining economic ends than any alternative system yet in sight, but that in itself is in many ways extremely objectionable.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Capitalism Economy Extreme Manage Object Thinking Wisdom
The idea behind stamped money is sound.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Ideas Money Sound Stamp
Conservatism leads nowhere; it satisfies no ideal.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Conservatism Ideal Satisfaction
Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Fade Market Yourself
I know of only three people who really understand money. A professor at another university. One of my students. And a rather junior clerk at the Bank of England.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Bank Known Myself People Understand University
The study of economics does not seem to require any specialised gifts of an unusually high order.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Economics Gift Order Special Study
For at least another hundred years we must pretend to ourselves and to every one that fair is foul and foul is fair; for foul is useful and fair is not. Avarice and usury and precaution must be our gods for a little longer still.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Fair God Oneself Pretend Soul
The power to become habituated to his surroundings is a marked characteristic of mankind.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Character Habitat Kind Man Power Surround
The numeric system was invented to help man to put order in the chaos of the world.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Chaos Help Invention Man System World
Pyramid-building, earthquakes, even wars may serve to increase wealth, if the education of our statesmen on the principles of the classical economics stands in the way of anything better.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Build Increase War Wealth
The political problem of mankind is to combine three things: economic efficiency, social justice and individual liberty.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Economy Kind Liberty Man Politics Problem Society
The right remedy for the trade cycle is not to be found in abolishing booms and thus keeping us permanently in a semi-slump; but in abolishing slumps and thus keeping us permanently in a quasi-boom.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Cycle Finding Permanent Remedy Right Trade
There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Currency Existence Subtle Sure
Economists must leave to Adam Smith alone the glory of the Quarto, must pluck the day, fling pamphlets into the wind, write always sub specie temporis , and achieve immortality by accident, if at all.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Accident Achievement Economist Immortal Writing
The principle objectives in life are love, the creation and enjoyment if aesthetic experience, the pursuit of knowledge. Love comes a long way first.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Experience Knowledge Life Love Objective Principle
When my information changes, I alter my conclusions. What do you do, sir?
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Change Conclusion Information Yourself
Once we allow ourselves to be disobedient to the test of an accountant’s profit, we have begun to change our civilization.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Allow Beginning Change Civilization Disobedient Profit
By a continuing process of inflation, government can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Citizenship Important Inflation Process Secret
There is nothing so disastrous as a rational investment policy in an irrational world.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Disaster Investment Rational World
How long will it be necessary to pay City men so entirely out of proportion to what other servants of society commonly receive for performing social services not less useful or difficult?
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Difficult Necessary Pay Performance Service
An investor who proposes to ignore near-term market fluctuations needs greater resources for safety and must not operate on so large a scale, if at all, with borrowed money.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Borrow Ignorance Investor Large Money Operate Propose Safety Scale
It is better to be roughly right than precisely wrong.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Better Choice Right Wrong
Americans are apt to be unduly interested in discovering what average opinion believes average opinion to be.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Average Believe Discover Interest Opinion
The central principle of investment is to go contrary to the general opinion, on the grounds that if everyone agreed about its merits, the investment is inevitably too dear and therefore unattractive.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Attractive General Ground Investment Opinion Principle

The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping the old ones, which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our minds.

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The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping the old ones, which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our minds.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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