quotations about debt
If you owe your bank a hundred pounds, you have a problem. But if you owe a million, it has.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES
The Washingtonian
No pecuniary consideration is more urgent, than the regular redemption and discharge of the public debt: on none can delay be more injurious, or an economy of time more valuable.
GEORGE WASHINGTON
message to the U. S. House of Representatives, Dec. 3, 1793
DEBT, n. An ingenious substitute for the chain and whip of the slave-driver. As, pent in an aquarium, the troutlet Swims round and round his tank to find an outlet, Pressing his nose against the glass that holds him, Nor ever sees the prison that enfolds him; So the poor debtor, seeing naught around him, Yet feels the narrow limits that impound him, Grieves at his debt and studies to evade it, And finds at last he might as well have paid it.
AMBROSE BIERCE
The Devil's Dictionary
Don't tell me debt is not a big deal. Debt will cut off your legs and laugh at you as you grovel in the dirt begging for mercy. If you don't need it, don't get it. If you can't afford it, don't get it. If you're already in debt, get out quickly. If you think you'll never get out, you're right, you won't.
OSAYI OSAR-EMOKPAE
Impossible Is Stupid
You know what you can do when you don't have any payments? Anything you want.
DAVE RAMSEY
daily tip
One of the greatest disservices you can do a man is to lend him money that he can't pay back.
JESSE HOLMAN JONES
New York Times Magazine, Jul. 2, 1939
Workin' three jobs just to stay in debt
WEIRD AL YANKOVIC
"Alimony", Even Worse
Money is sacred as everyone knows... So then must be the hunger for it and the means we use to obtain it. Once a man is in debt he becomes a flesh and blood form of money, a walking investment. You can do what you like with him, you can work him to death or you can sell him. This cannot be called cruelty or greed because we are seeking only to recover our investment and that is a sacred duty.
BARRY UNSWORTH
Sacred Hunger
There are but few things that crush the life out of one like a burden of debt. They break our spirit, crush our ambitions, destroy our homes, and drive us to despair as nothing else can do.
NICIAS BALLARD COOKSEY
Helps to Happiness
Debt is the worst poverty.
LICHTWER
attributed, Day's Collacon
We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt.
THOMAS JEFFERSON
letter to Samuel Kerchevel, Jul. 12, 1816
There's nothing as short as short-term debt.
EVAN ESAR
20,000 Quips & Quotes
Debt rolls a man over and over, binding him hand and foot, and letting him hang upon the fatal mesh until the long-legged interest devours him.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Neither a borrower nor a lender be; for loan oft loses both itself and friend.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Hamlet
Debt is beautiful only after it is repaid.
RUSSIAN PROVERB
If a man owes me money, I never seem to forget.
But if I do the owing, I somehow never remember.
ARISTOPHANES
The Clouds
Pay every debt as if God wrote the bill.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
fragment, May-Day and Other Pieces
Some people worry because they are in debt; others, because they can't even get in.
EVAN ESAR
20,000 Quips & Quotes
A person in debt is like a wounded patient. The first thing any doctor would recommend is to stop the bleeding.
ANTHONY JOBS
"How to Get Out of Credit Card Debt", Inquirer, January 23, 2019
Investing without debt is like cooking without gasoline: Of course, gasoline can be dangerous, but if we learn to use it properly, we can see better results. Investors who utilize debt can transcend the current money paradigm that most people live by. Numbers people see it as a simple argument of interest/return rate arbitrage where they pair a lower interest rate with a higher rate of return. It's a game of arbitrage and it is at the core of the banking industry.
LANE KAWAOKA
"Is All Debt Bad Debt?", Forbes, March 29, 2019