John Kenneth Galbraith

“Nothing so gives the illusion of intelligence as personal association with large sums of money.”

“Of all the mysteries of the stock exchange there is none so impenetrable as why there should be a buyer for everyone who seeks to sell. October 24, 1929 showed that what is mysterious is not inevitable. Often there were no buyers, and only wide vertical declines could anyone be induced to bid.”

“What we do know is that speculative episodes never come gently to an end. The wise, though for most the improbable, course is to assume the worst.”

“Neither regulation nor memory is a perfect protection against the will to delude one’s self or others. If people are sufficiently persuaded of their own wizardry or that of others, they and their money will be separated.”

“Economists, when they seek to be profound, often succeed only in being wrong.”

“Laws have been passed to outlaw some of the more egregious behavior which contributed to the big bull market of the twenties. Nothing has been done about the seminal lunacy which possesses people who see a chance of becoming rich.”

“It is easy enough to burst a bubble. To incise it with a needle so that it subsides gradually is an operation of undoubted delicacy.”

“I do strongly urge that we be as cautious as ever in reposing too great confidence in men of great financial position.”

“Once a boom is well started, it cannot be arrested. It can only be collapsed.”

“The occupational disease of the speculator is acute uneasiness.”

“It is the sovereign privilege of a free citizen to lose his money precisely as he pleases.”

“Booms start with some tie-in to reality, some reason which justifies the increase in asset values, and then — and this is the critical feature of speculative mood — the market loses touch with reality.”

“Wall Street has always been much esteemed as something to blame.”

“The stock market does have a life of its own.”

“Forecasting is a notoriously underpaid profession, and extremely risky to boot, so I avoid it.”