A Quote by Robert Higgs

Notwithstanding what some regard as the institutionalization of compassion, the transfer society quashes genuine virtue. Redistribution of income by means of government coercion is a form of theft. Its supporters attempt to disguise its essential character by claiming that democratic procedures give it legitimacy, but this justification is specious. Theft is theft, whether it be carried out by one thief or by a hundred million thieves acting in concert. And it is impossible to found a good society on the institutionalization of theft.

Robert Higgs

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Acting Attempt Carried Character Claiming Coercion Compassion Concert Democratic Disguise Essential Form Found Genuine Give Good Government Hundred Impossible Income Justification Legitimacy Means Million Notwithstanding Out Procedures Redistribution Regard Society Some Supporters Theft Thief Thieves Transfer Virtue Whether

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Robert Higgs
American - Economist
Born: February 1, 1944

Slavery is theft - theft of a life, theft of work, theft of any property or produce, theft even of the children a slave might have borne.

Kevin Bales

Government income redistribution programs produce the same result as theft. In fact, that's what a thief does; he redistributes income. The difference between government and thievery is mostly a matter of legality.

Walter E. Williams

Three-fifths to two-thirds of the federal budget consists of taking property from one American and giving it to another. Were a private person to do the same thing, we'd call it theft. When government does it, we euphemistically call it income redistribution, but that's exactly what thieves do - redistribute income. Income redistribution not only betrays the founders' vision, it's a sin in the eyes of God.

Walter E. Williams

The evolution of government from its medieval, Mafia-like character to that embodying modern legal institutions and instruments is a major part of the history of freedom. It is a part that tends to be obscured or ignored because of the myopic vision of many economists, who persist in modeling government as nothing more than a gigantic form of theft and income redistribution.

Douglass North

The thief, as will become apparent, was a special type of thief. This thief was an artist of theft. Other thieves merely stole everything that was not nailed down, but this thief stole the nails as well.

Terry Pratchett

I certainly don't know if you could claim that every theft is wrong, but I'll prove to you that every theft is forbidden, by simply locking you up.

Karel Capek

And like most middle-aged people who hear the clock ticking in their lives, I had come to resent a waste or theft of my time that was greater than any theft of my goods or money.

James Lee Burke

As the economy goes south, petty theft begins. And then grand theft. And then muggings.

John McAfee

Let me make it clear: The Disbursement Allocation Program is not pork barrel. Of the DAP releases in 2011 and 2012, only nine percent was disbursed for projects suggested by legislators. The DAP is not theft. Theft is illegal.

Benigno Aquino III

There can be no such thing as 'fairness in taxation.' Taxation is nothing but organized theft, and the concept of a 'fair tax' is therefore every bit as absurd as that of 'fair theft.'

Murray Rothbard

A society without the means to detect lies and theft soon squanders its liberty and freedom.

Chris Hedges

Now, no matter what the mullah teaches, there is only one sin, only one. And that is theft. Every other sin is a variation of theft.

Khaled Hosseini

Abetted by misguided or co-opted intellectuals, the rulers weave a cloak of legitimacy to disguise their theft and hence to ease their extraction of wealth from the rightful owners.

Robert Higgs

People equated burning CDs with theft. That's not what burning CDs is. Theft is about acquiring the music from the Internet.

Steve Jobs

We hear a lot about identity theft when someone takes your wallet and pretends to be you and uses your credit cards. But the more serious identity theft is to get swallowed up in other people's definition of you.

Stephen Covey

A libertarian presidential candidate isn't going to win anyway, so he can afford to say that all taxation is theft, and it isn't the job of a libertarian presidential candidate to cook up new ways to commit theft.

L. Neil Smith

A Quote by Robert Higgs

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