This relationship is the foundation for the argument, made by some trade unionists and labour advocates, that high wages can actually be "good for business". The precedent set by Henry Ford in 1914, who offered workers $5.00 per day (a very high wage at the time) so they could afford to buy the same cars they made, is often invoked.

We know that investment causes growth. But it is also true that growth causes investment.

If you want poor people to work you restore their incentive by giving them less, such as by cutting social services. If you want rich people to work you restore their incentive by giving them more, such as by cutting taxes.

Indeed, if communist central planners could have organized the economy with as much detail, precision, and flexibility as a modern-day Toyota or Wal-Mart, communism would probably still exist.

The problem is not scarcity; the problem is power.

Never trust an economist with your job. Learn about economics yourself. And make up your own mind about what might protect your job - and what might destroy it.

Proving that profit is economically and morally justifiable, rather than the result of exploitation, has been a central preoccupation of neoclassical economists.