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If each member of society can be induced or impelled to do his allotted task by associating it with some motive that appears to him adequate, then he need never know how he is contributing to the real end, and need not even be aware of the end at all. It is this problem of organization that we shall call the Economic Problem. It is in fact the real subject matter of political economy.

— Ralph George Hawtrey The Economic Problem (1925)

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More quotes by Ralph George Hawtrey

Banks lend by creating credit. They create the means of payment out of nothing.

That was to cry, Fire, Fire, in Noah's Flood.

A Century of Bank Rate (1938)

By its means the banker creates the means of payment out of nothing, whereas when he receives a bag of money from his customer, one means of payment, a bank credit, is merely substituted for another, an equal amount of cash.

Currency and Credit (1919)

The total effective demand for commodities in the market is limited to the number of units of money of account that dealers are prepared to offer, and the number they are prepared to offer over any period of time is limited according to the number they hope to receive.

Currency and Credit (1919)

Man is a rational animal, and if human affairs are hard to regulate, his twofold nature is usually the cause. Reason is something ultimate; it would be the same in another planet, or in another universe, as it is here. Animal nature is something contingent; it might have been different. Our life is a compromise, a blend between the animal and the rational.

The Economic Problem (1925)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Ralph George Hawtrey (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.