When workers can get and equal return for less effort, workers make less effort

I was ashamed for people to see me struggle.

Government has no wealth of its own. Before it gives anything to anyone, it must take from those who produced it.

The theory of government I was taught says that government provides benefits, primarily security, to the entire population. In return we pay taxes. But lately the government has been a distributor of special privileges, taking money from some and giving it to others. America is now about evenly split between those who pay income taxes and those who consume them.

Fraud will always exist. Enforcement of anti-fraud laws is a useful deterrent, but in the end there's no substitute for investor vigilance. Government regulations provide a false sense of security - and that's worth less than no sense of security at all.

Markets are too complex to manipulate beneficially.

Madoff's scam was small compared to Ponzi schemes the government itself runs: Social Security and Medicare.