Sociotropic voters with biased economic beliefs are more likely to produce severe political failures than are selfish voters with rational expectations.

Worldviews are more a mental security blanket than a serious effort to understand the world

In daily life, reality gives us material incentives to restrain our irrationality. But what incentive do we have to think rationally about politics?

In a modern democracy, not only can a libertarian be elitist; a libertarian has to be elitist. To be a libertarian in a modern democracy is to say that nearly 300 million Americans are wrong, and a handful of nay-sayers are right.

The best social insurance is to make more progress, not to make more work

There are two sources of error: Either you lack sufficient data, or you fail to take advantage of the data that you have.

There is a small minority of well-educated people with relatively sensible views on economics, and an extremely tiny minority of economists with highly sensible views. Then there's everybody else. ... To win, a politician needs to please the median voter. It makes little difference if a few thousand economists think you a fool.