A Quote by Richard Layard, Baron Layard

Competition for status is a zero sum game

Richard Layard, Baron Layard

Quote Topics

Competition Game Status Sum Zero Zero Sum Game

Quote Author

Richard Layard, Baron Layard
British - Economist
Born: March 15, 1934

One problem with politics is that it is a zero sum game, i.e. politicians argue how to cut the pie smaller and smaller, by reshuffling pieces of the pie. I think this is destructive. Instead, we should be creating a bigger pie, i.e. funding the science that is the source of all our prosperity. Science is not a zero sum game.

Michio Kaku

Trump sees the world in terms of a zero-sum game. In reality, globalisation, if well managed, is a positive-sum force: America gains if its friends and allies - whether Australia, the E.U., or Mexico - are stronger. But Trump's approach threatens to turn it into a negative-sum game: America will lose, too.

Joseph Stiglitz

Writers aren't in competition with one another. It isn't a zero sum game. If you have a good book, a good cover, a good product description, and a low price, you can sell well.

J. A. Konrath

On the political front, of course it's a zero-sum game. If it's all white males holding positions, you bring 10 women in, then it's, 'Women are coming!' Get 10 blacks and it's, 'Blacks are coming!' 'Hispanics are coming!' Zero-sum game. The seatmates might change but the chairs don't move. In the economy, the number of chairs can actually increase.

Jesse Jackson

International politics is no longer a zero-sum game but a multi-dimensional arena where cooperation and competition often occur simultaneously. Gone is the age of blood feuds. World leaders are expected to lead in turning threats into opportunities.

Hassan Rouhani

We still find, especially in parts of academe, the damaging notion that everything is a struggle for power, or being empowered, or hegemony, or oppression: and that all competition is a zero-sum game. This is not more than repetition of Lenin's destructive doctrine. Intellectually, it is reductionism; politically, it is fanaticism.

Robert Conquest

We act like a zero-sum society, when in reality there is a lot of non zero-sum fat to be skimmed off to everyone's mutual advantage.

Howard Raiffa

President Trump sees the world in transactional and zero-sum terms - if something is good for China, it must be bad for the U.S. By contrast, economists see the world in much more nuanced ways: if globalization is well-managed, it can be a positive-sum game, where both the U.S. and China gain; if it is badly managed, it can be negative-sum.

Joseph Stiglitz

Life is a zero sum game.

George Carlin

Death is a zero sum game for which there is no cure.

S. Jay Olshansky

In a zero-sum game, the problem is entirely one of distribution, not at all one of production.

Kenneth Waltz

The discussion of derivatives in the political world has become a zero sum game.

Jim Himes

We know what happens when Europeans start dividing themselves up and emphasizing their differences and seeing a competition between various countries in a zero sum way.