The Words of Thomas Sowell

Socialism in general has a record of failure so blatant that only an intellectual could ignore or evade it. Even countries that were once more prosperous than their neighbors have found themselves much poorer than their neighbors after just one generation of socialistic policies.

— The Thomas Sowell Reader (2011)

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Have you ever heard anyone as incoherent as the people staging protests across the country? Taxpayers ought to be protesting against having their money spent to educate people who end up unable to say anything beyond repeating political catch phrases.

— Random thoughts on the passing scene (2011)

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Virtually every stupid idea in vogue today was thought of by somebody in the past — and has led to disaster, again and again. That is why it is dangerous to neglect the study of history, so that we have to keep on learning what is wrong with clever ideas the hard way. Do we need to keep repeating the same mistakes forever?

— Random Thoughts (2001)

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People in minimum wage jobs do not stay at the minimum wage permanently. Their pay increases as they accumulate experience and develop skills. It increases an average of 30 percent in just their first year of employment, according to the Cato Institute study. Other studies show that low-income people become average-income people in a few years and high-income people later in life. All of this depends on their having a job in the first place, however. But the living wage kills jobs.

— Ever Wonder Why? And Other Controversial Essays (2006)

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Facts are seldom allowed to contaminate the beautiful vision of the left. What matters to the true believers are the ringing slogans, endlessly repeated. Darwinian adaptation to environment applies not only to nature but also to society. Just as you don’t find eagles living in the ocean or fish living on mountain tops, so you don’t find leftists concentrated where their ideas have to stand the test of performance.

— The Thomas Sowell Reader (2011)

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Some things are believed because they are demonstrably true. But many other things are believed simply because they have been asserted repeatedly—and repetition has been accepted as a substitute for evidence.

— Economic Facts and Fallacies (2008)

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Envy was once considered to be one of the seven deadly sins before it became one of the most admired virtues under its new name, 'social justice'.

— The Quest for Cosmic Justice (1999)

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The road to hell is paved with Ivy League degrees.

— Uncommon Knowledge - Thomas Sowell on the second edition of Intellectuals and Society (2012)

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The politically correct party line on minimum wages is that people cannot afford to raise their families on low pay, so the government has to force employers to provide "a living wage" for families. But the vast majority of people making minimum wages are youngsters just beginning their careers.

— Controversial Essays (2002)

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The fundamental problem of the political Left seems to be that the real world does not fit their preconceptions. Therefore, they see the real world as what is wrong and what needs to be changed, since apparently their preconceptions cannot be wrong.

— The Mindset of the Left: Part III (2013)

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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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Entitlement" is not only the opposite of achievement, it undermines incentives to do all the hard work that leads to achievement.

— Controversial Essays (2002)

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If you have always believed that everyone should play by the same rules and be judged by the same standards, that would have gotten you labeled a radical 50 years ago, a liberal 25 years ago and a racist today.

— Controversial Essays (2002)

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Barack Obama’s political genius is his ability to say things that will sound good to people who have not followed the issues in any detail, regardless of how obviously fraudulent what he says may be to those who have.

— Obama’s ‘Balanced’ Approach (2011)

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Would you bet your paycheck on a weather forecast for tomorrow? If not, then why should this country bet billions on 'global warming' predictions that have even less foundation?

— Random Thoughts (1999)

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There is really nothing very mysterious about why our public schools are failures. When you select the poorest quality college students to be public school teachers, give them iron-clad tenure, a captive audience, and pay them according to seniority rather than performance, why should the results be surprising?

— Is Reality Optional (1993)

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Anyone who wants reparations based on history will have to gerrymander history very carefully. Otherwise, practically everybody would owe reparations to practically everybody else.

— The Benfits And Hypocrisy Of Playing The Slavery Card (1995)

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The concept of ‘microaggression’ is just one of many tactics used to stifle differences of opinion by declaring some opinions to be ‘hate speech,’ instead of debating those differences in a marketplace of ideas. To accuse people of aggression for not marching in lockstep with political correctness is to set the stage for justifying real aggression against them.”

— Micro-totalitarianism (2015)

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One of the bittersweet things about growing old is realizing how mistaken you were when you were young. As a young political leftist, I saw the left as the voice of the common man. Nothing could be further from the truth.

— Is Reality Optional (1993)

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