22 Quotes by Raghuram G. Rajan

A book is almost always a collective effort, even if it has only a single author.

We have all been hacked, the only question is whether you know it or you don’t’.

We have long understood that it is not income that matters but consumption. Stripped to its essentials, the argument is that if somehow the consumption of middle-class householders keeps up, if they can afford a new car every few years and the occasional exotic holiday, perhaps they will pay less attention to their stagnant monthly paychecks.

India is becoming a large middle income country, too complex and varied to be controlled centrally. The government will need to withdraw from occupying the commanding heights of the economy, confining itself to providing public goods and the governing framework, and leaving economic activity to the people.

It involves considerable change, and change is risky. But as India develops, not changing is even riskier. We have to keep what is good about our system, of which there is a tremendous amount, even while acting differently where warranted.

Cynical as it may seem, easy credit has been used as a palliative throughout history by governments that are unable to address the deeper anxieties of the middle class directly.

I thought there might be some grand design I did not understand, but the government’s policy clearly was not working, because India was still poor. I was determined to learn more, so I became interested in economics. This book is another unintended consequence of the government’s policies.

Society suffers when any of the pillars weakens or strengthens overly relative to the others. Too weak the markets and society becomes unproductive, too weak a democratic community and society tends toward crony capitalism, too weak the state and society turns fearful and apathetic. Conversely, too much market and society becomes inequitable, too much community and society becomes static, and too much state and society becomes authoritarian. A balance is essential!

Excessive rural credit was one of the important causes of bank failure during the Great Depression.