Alfred P. Sloan quote: “Only in more production and in new production can the American standard of living be increased and the economy be sound.”

“…if you increase living standards you make labor more productive. This is why Asia today is becoming more productive than the United States.”

Michael Hudson (economist) (1939) American economist

" "Higher Taxes on Top 1% Equals Higher Productivity http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=6000", Video Interview (13:28), The Real News Network (TRNN) (January 1, 2011)

“Without question it starts us toward a better standard of living and increases purchasing power to buy the products of farm and factory.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) 32nd President of the United States

1930s, Fireside Chat in the night before signing the Fair Labor Standards (1938)
Context: After many requests on my part the Congress passed a Fair Labor Standards Act, commonly called the Wages and Hours Bill. That Act — applying to products in interstate commerce-ends child labor, sets a floor below wages and a ceiling over hours of labor. Except perhaps for the Social Security Act, it is the most far-reaching, far-sighted program for the benefit of workers ever adopted here or in any other country. Without question it starts us toward a better standard of living and increases purchasing power to buy the products of farm and factory.

“There are great economic opportunities ahead of us. If we are sensible, we can have rising production and rising standards of living without constantly rising prices. Why should we not aim to double our standard of living in the next 20 years, and still have our money as valuable then as now? The faster we modernize and expand our productive capacity, the more we shall be able to increase the national wealth.”

Rab Butler (1902–1982) British politician

Speech to the quarterly meeting of the National Production Advisory Council on Industry (28 May 1954), quoted in The Times (29 May 1954), p. 3
Chancellor of the Exchequer

“Peter Drucker wasn’t exaggerating when he noted that the fate of advanced economies depends on making knowledge workers more productive. There is no business or economic issue that is more important to our long-term competitiveness and standard of living.”

Thomas H. Davenport (1954) American academic

Source: Thinking for a Living, 2005, p.208

“Increase on productivity and decrease in unit costs (often identified with economies of scale) resulted far more from the increases in the volume and velocity of throughput then from a growth in the size of the factory and plant.”

Alfred D. Chandler, Jr. (1918–2007) American historian

Source: The Visible Hand (1977), p. 281; Cited in: Best (1990, p. 48).

“Productivity, however, is exactly the wrong thing to care about in the new economy.”

Kevin Kelly (1952) American author and editor

Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World (1995), New Rules for the New Economy: 10 Radical Strategies for a Connected World (1999)

“Why, then, should we have to lower our living standards? What is the mysterious source of the economic loss? If productivity is increasing, why should we sacrifice services and wages?”

Robert Kuttner (1943) American journalist

Epilogue: Politics, p. 272
The Economic Illusion (1984)

“The last chapter modeled technological progress as an increase in the number of types of products, N. In this chapter, we allow for improvements in the quality or productivity of each type. This approach has come to be known as the Schumpeterian approach to endogenous growth. We can think of increases in N as basic innovations that amount to dramatically new kinds of goods or methods of production. In contrast, increases in the quality of the existing products involve a continuing series of improvements and refinements of goods and techniques.”

Robert Barro (1944) American classical macroeconomist

Robert J. Barro, Xavier Sala-i-Martin, Economic growth 2nd ed. (2004), Ch. 7 : Technological Change: Schumpeterian Models of Quality Ladders

“The last chapter modeled technological progress as an increase in the number of types of products, N. In this chapter, we allow for improvements in the quality or productivity of each type. This approach has come to be known as the Schumpeterian approach to endogenous growth. We can think of increases in N as basic innovations that amount to dramatically new kinds of goods or methods of production. In contrast, increases in the quality of the existing products involve a continuing series of improvements and refinements of goods and techniques.”

Xavier Sala-i-Martin (1962) Catalan economist

Robert J. Barro, Xavier Sala-i-Martin, Economic growth 2nd ed. (2004), Ch. 7 : Technological Change: Schumpeterian Models of Quality Ladders

“It's a "hits" economy where resources flow to those that show some life. If a new novel, new product, or new service begins to succeed it is fed more; if it falters its left to wither.”

Kevin Kelly (1952) American author and editor

Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World (1995), New Rules for the New Economy: 10 Radical Strategies for a Connected World (1999)

“Only in more production and in new production can the American standard of living be increased and the economy be sound.”

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