“It's amazing to me how many people think that voting to have the government give poor people money is compassion. Helping poor and suffering people is compassion. Voting for our government to use guns to give money to help poor and suffering people is immoral self-righteous bullying laziness.
People need to be fed, medicated, educated, clothed, and sheltered, and if we're compassionate we'll help them, but you get no moral credit for forcing other people to do what you think is right. There is great joy in helping people, but no joy in doing it at gunpoint.”

— Penn Jillette

2010s, I don't know, so I'm an atheist libertarian (2011)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

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Penn Jillette 49

American magician 1955

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“I think it is very beautiful for the poor to accept their lot, to share it with the passion of Christ. I think the world is being much helped by the suffering of the poor people.”

Matka Tereza (1910–1997) Roman Catholic saint of Albanian origin

As quoted by Christopher Hitchens in The Missionary Position http://books.google.com/books?id=PTgJIjK67rEC&pg=PA11&dq=%22I+think+it+is+very+beautiful+for+the+poor+to+accept+their+lot%22, (Verso, 1995), page 11
1990s

“It is rather more noble to help people purely out of concern for their suffering than it is to help them because you think the Creator of the Universe wants you to do it, or will reward you for doing it, or will punish you for not doing it. The problem with this linkage between religion and morality is that it gives people bad reasons to help other human beings when good reasons are available.”

Sam Harris (1967) American author, philosopher and neuroscientist

Sam Harris, Beyond Belief 2006 conference
2000s

“If the goal is to help the poor, why not give them the money directly?”

Harvey S. Rosen (1949) American economist

Source: Public Finance - International Edition - Sixth Edition, Chapter 20, Public Finance in a Federal System, p. 501
Context: Why should the central government be in the business of giving unconditional grants to states and localities? The usual response is that such grants can equalize the income distribution. It is not clear that this argument stands up under scrutiny. Even if a goal of public policy is to help poor people, it does not follow that the best way to do so is to help poor communities. After all, the chances that a community with a low average income will probably have some relatively rich members and vice versa. If the goal is to help the poor, why not give them the money directly?

“Many times in history, people have voted our people they didn't want and ended up with people they didn't need. But let me assure you that you have not voted out one bad government only to end up with another.”

Bukola Saraki (1962) Nigerian politician

Inaugural Address (2003)

“So it's a mistake for someone to think that they bailed New York out. They did assist us, for which we are grateful, but it's a mistake to say we bailed New York out by giving them a grant of money to help those poor people who throw it away on welfare.”

David Dinkins (1927) former mayor of New York City

On New York as the capital of the world. Quoted in an interview by PBS http://www.pbs.org/wnet/newyork/series/interview/dinkins.html

“We believe that an active government should focus on doing what it can to help people get on with their lives.This is the true measure of a compassionate government.”

Theresa May (1956) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech to the Conservative Party conference http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2002/oct/07/conservatives2002.conservatives1 (07 October 2002)
Context: How can students and parents plan for the future when they can't rely on the country's examination system to deliver fair results? We reject Labour's "government knows best" approach, but we certainly don't subscribe to a philosophy that lets people sink or swim. We believe that an active government should focus on doing what it can to help people get on with their lives. This is the true measure of a compassionate government.

“You can't help poor people and be comfortable. You know, the two things are just not compatible. If you want to really give good health care to poor people you've got to be prepared to be a little uncomfortable and to put a little bit of sacrifice behind it.”

Dolores Huerta (1930) American labor leader

1974 speech, in Voices of Multicultural America: Notable Speeches Delivered by African, Asian, Hispanic and Native Americans, 1790-1995 by Deborah Gillan Straub

“Countries are poor not because their people are lazy; their people are 'lazy' because they are poor.”

Ha-Joon Chang book Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism

Prologue, p. 18
Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism (2008)

“Poor people have been voting for Democrats for the last fifty years… and they are still poor.”

Charles Barkley (1963) American basketball player

Attributed to Charles Barkley in Walter W. Moore's Wise Sayings (2012), p. 89

“It is almost enough to make one's jaw drop to think that officials at the World Bank and the IMF would suggest that they have poverty alleviation in mind when they force governments to withdraw subsidies that enable poor people to get clean water to drink. If this is a policy aimed at helping the world's poor, it's interesting to imagine what a policy aimed at hurting the world's poor would look like.”

Linda McQuaig (1951) journalist and author

All You Can Eat: Greed, Lust and the New Capitalism (2001)

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