Edward Conard

“Republicans' focus on defunding or scaling back Obamacare - an unpopular entitlement program - rather than entitlements generally, namely Social Security and Medicare, has raised questions about their true objective. But critics forget that spending is fungible.”

“When all is said and done, you're either for investment and risk taking as a solution for what ails the economy, or you're against it. The real world offers no middle ground.”

“You have to motivate people to take almost certain failure to get a small amount of success, which has driven our economy forward.”

“When I look around, I see a world of unrealized opportunities for improvements, an abundance of talented people able to take the risks necessary to make improvements, but a shortage of people and investors willing to take those risks.”

“What is competent? Who is it that can adjudicate what is competent or not competent? If the guys that are running the most important banks in our country aren't competent enough, well then, who is competent enough?”

“I am the individual who formed and funded W Spann LLC. I authorized W Spann LLC's contribution to Restore Our Future PAC. I did so after consulting prominent legal counsel regarding the transaction and based on my understanding that the contribution would comply with applicable laws.”

“Lowering the middle-class tax rate... will likely lower work efforts and increase government dependence.”

“Let's not kid ourselves about just how cheap offshore labor really is. We not only pay substantially less per hour: we also avoid the costs we would incur if these workers immigrated here. We don't pay for their medical expenses when they show up in the emergency room without insurance.”

“Economics is counterintuitive. It just is.”

“Making products for $17 an hour that we could have purchased for 75 cents an hour wastes resources that we could have used elsewhere.”

“To advocate both for more immigration and for faster wage growth for the working and middle class is to work at cross-purposes.”

“I have no interest in bailing out anybody, quite frankly, and I think banks have to suffer every dollar of loss if they make a bad loan.”

“We have made a decision in our economy to lower taxes on successful risk-taking and have been very successful relative to Europe and Japan.”

“In today's information-driven economy, business and scientific talent constrains growth.”

“There are two ways to think about the one percent - the Bernie Sanders way, where we're all competing for a zero-sum pie where it's just a question of negotiations. The second way, which is the one I put forward, is no, it's really innovation in a knowledge-based economy.”

“Most citizens are consumers, not investors. They don't recognize the benefits to consumers that come from investment.”

“Lesser-skilled workers suffer the entire burden of lower wages but capture only a portion of the benefits from lower-priced offshore goods.”

“Talented people have a responsibility to get the training they need to be successful risk takers and go out there to take risks. What I see is surplus of talented people and a shortage of people willing to take the risks.”

“As the news media eagerly report on polls showing that millennials increasingly reject capitalism, progressives energetically push the Democratic Party to the left.”

“God didn't create the universe so that talented people would be happy.”