Angus Deaton Quotes

Angus Deaton

Profession : Economist

Birth : October 19, 1945

It's hard to think that Mark Zuckerberg is actually impoverishing anyone by getting rich with Facebook. But driverless cars are another matter entirely.

Angus Deaton

People on left have to better understand what are the benefits of inequality, and people on right have to understand better what the dangers are... It has to become properly hardwired into the American democratic debate in a way that it hasn't really been.

Angus Deaton

The globalization that has rescued so many in poor countries has harmed some people in rich countries, as factories and jobs migrated to where labor is cheaper.

Angus Deaton

I really don't think we've become a plutocracy, but I worry about the enormous influence that money has in a democracy such as ours.

Angus Deaton

What is not OK is for rent-seekers to get rich.

Angus Deaton

It is true that globalization has fueled greater income inequality. But much of this increase should be welcomed, not condemned. There is nothing inherently bad about inequality. Whether it is bad depends on how it comes about and what it does.

Angus Deaton

Businesses have moved from doing business to doing lobbying, and I think that's a very bad thing.

Angus Deaton

Globalisation, for me, seems to be not first-order harm, and I find it very hard not to think about the billion people who have been dragged out of poverty as a result.

Angus Deaton

Success breeds inequality, and you don't want to choke off success.

Angus Deaton

A lot of our sources for income-inequality measures come from household surveys in which people report how much they earned in the last year, how much income they have, and so on. Those are not as well funded as they should be. We need to have those numbers.

Angus Deaton

A lot of people in America and Europe feel that their governments are not representing them very much.

Angus Deaton

I grew up pretty poor - not poor compared with people in India or Africa who are really poor, but poor enough so that the worry about money really cast a pall over your life a lot of the time.

Angus Deaton

You accumulate emotional wisdom as you get older. You know, when you're 25, you go on blind dates with people that, when you're 50, you know to stay away from.

Angus Deaton

In the high-income English-speaking world, the elderly get treated very well indeed.

Angus Deaton

There is much that remains mysterious about why some countries grow rapidly and some grow slowly.

Angus Deaton

If poverty and underdevelopment are primarily consequences of poor institutions, then by weakening those institutions or stunting their development, large aid flows do exactly the opposite of what they are intended to do.

Angus Deaton

My work shows how important it is that independent researchers should have access to data so that government statistics can be checked and so that the democratic debate within India can be informed by the different interpretations of different scholars.

Angus Deaton

Economic growth is very important, but it is not the only thing, and it must be accompanied by sharing with those who are left behind, through effective social services and provision.

Angus Deaton