The Words of Thomas Sowell

Freedom has cost too much blood and agony to be relinquished at the cheap price of rhetoric.

— Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

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Equality of rights does not mean equality of results. I can have all the equal treatment in the world on a golf course and I will not finish within shouting distance of Tiger Woods.

— Affirmative Action and Gay Marriage (2008)

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The number of Whites who were enslaved in North Africa by the Barbary pirates exceeded the number of Africans enslaved in the United States and in the American colonies before that put together. But nobody is going to North Africa to ask for reparations.

— Maverick: Jason Riley On The Life And Times Of Thomas Sowell (2020)

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High tax rates in the upper income brackets allow politicians to win votes with class warfare rhetoric, painting their opponents as defenders of the rich. Meanwhile, the same politicians can win donations from the rich by creating tax loopholes that can keep the rich from actually paying those higher tax rates - or perhaps any taxes at all. What is worse than class warfare is phony class warfare. Slippery talk about 'fairness' is at the heart of this fraud by politicians seeking to squander more of the nation's resources.

— The 'Fairness' Fraud (2012)

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The assumption that spending more of the taxpayers' money will make things better has survived all kinds of evidence that it has made things worse.

— Is Reality Optional (1993)

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More frightening than any particular beliefs or policies is an utter lack of any sense of a need to test those beliefs and policies against hard evidence. Mistakes can be corrected by those who pay attention to facts but dogmatism will not be corrected by those who are wedded to a vision.

— Who Really Cares? (2006)

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I've often said there are three questions that would destroy most of the arguments on the left. The first is 'compared to what?' The second is 'at what cost?' And the third is 'what hard evidence do you have?'

— Thomas Sowell: In The Right Direction (2005)

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The average American today has a standard of living that includes things that only the upper crust could have afforded in times past—and some things that even the rich didn’t have in past generations, like personal computers. But are the people who made that possible even mentioned, much less publicized and praised? There is not an inventor, scientist, medical researcher, or industrialist who is as well known as loudmouths like Rosie O’Donnell or Jesse Jackson. Any bimbo who exposes her body can get more attention than someone who finds ways to reduce the cost of housing for millions of people. In California, the bimbo can get favorable attention while the developer is condemned.

— Dismantling America: And Other Controversial Essays (2010), p. 203

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In the United States, the group hardest hit by minimum wage laws are black male teenagers. Those who refuse to admit that the minimum wage is the reason for high unemployment rates among young blacks blame racism, lack of education and whatever else occurs to them.

— Dismantling America: And Other Controversial Essays (2010)

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The first lesson of economics is scarcity: There is never enough of anything to satisfy all those who want it. The first lesson of politics is to disregard the first lesson of economics.

— Is Reality Optional (1993)

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Continuing transactions between buyer and seller make sense only if value is subjective, each getting what is worth more subjectively. Economic transactions are not a zero-sum process, where one person loses whatever the other person gains.

— Basic Economics (2000)

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The fact that so many successful politicians are such shameless liars is not only a reflection on them, it is also a reflection on us. When the people want the impossible, only liars can satisfy them, and only in the short run.

— Big Lies in Politics (2012)

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If you are not prepared to use force to defend civilization, then be prepared to accept barbarism.

— Is Reality Optional (1993)

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Among the people appointed as czars by President Obama have been people who have praised enemy dictators like Mao, or who have seen the public schools as places to promote sexual practices contrary to the values of most Americans, to a captive audience of children. Those who say that the Obama administration should have investigated those people more thoroughly before appointing them are missing the point completely. Why should we assume that Barack Obama didn’t know what such people were like, when he has been associating with precisely these kinds of people for decades before he reached the White House? Nothing is more consistent with his lifelong patterns than putting such people in government—people who reject American values, resent Americans in general and successful Americans in particular, as well as resenting America’s influence in the world.

— Dismantling America: And Other Controversial Essays (2010), p. 6-7

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It is not enough for us to discover belatedly that we have been lied to. It is far more important that we remember who the liars are and not be so gullible next time.

— Barbarians Inside the Gates and Other Controversial Essays (1999)

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The problem isn't that Johnny can't read. The problem isn't even that Johnny can't think. The problem is that Johnny doesn't know what thinking is; he confuses it with feeling.

— Inside American Education (1993), Ch. 1

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Yes. Some years ago, the politicians in Maryland decided they were going to raise more revenue by increasing the taxes on people who had an income of a million dollars a year or more. But after they did this, the number of people with incomes of a million dollars or more in Maryland went down. Because rich people were not chess pieces, they moved out of Maryland. Instead of getting $100 million in new tax revenue like they predicted, Maryland got $200 million less in revenue.

— Thomas Sowell on Social Justice Fallacies: Racial Fallacies (2024)

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Our children and grandchildren may yet curse the day we began hyping race and ethnicity. There are countries where that has led to slaughters in the streets but you cannot name a country where it has led to greater harmony.

— Random Thoughts (2001)

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Although the big word on the left is 'compassion,' the big agenda on the left is dependency.

— Depending on Dependency (2012)

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Slavery has existed all over the planet for thousands of years, with black, white, yellow and other races being both slaves and enslavers. Does that mean that everybody ought to apologize to everybody else for what their ancestors did?

— Dismantling America: And Other Controversial Essays (2010), p. 238

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