Michael Bloomberg Quotes

To a contrarian like me, constant advice not to do something almost always starts me quickly down the risky, unpopular path.

Because of my success in the private sector, I had the chance to run America's largest city for 12 years, governing in the wake of its greatest tragedy.

Mayors are very different, because mayors can't be on both sides of every issue. Mayors have to take an explicit stance. Just go with your gut and say what you believe, and you'll be fine. If you're not fine, at least you'll like what you see in the mirror.

I understand the appeal of a businessman president. But Trump's business plan is a disaster in the making.

I don't believe that government is good at picking technology, particularly technology that is changing. By the time you get it done and go through democracy, it's so outdated.

And I think the more money you put in people's hands, the more they will spend. And if they don't spend it, they invest it. And investing it is another way of creating jobs. It puts money into mutual funds or other kinds of banks that can go out and make loans, and we need to do that.

Progress really is possible.

Central planning didn't work for Stalin or Mao, and it won't work for an entrepreneur either.

I have two daughters that are the loves of my life and I want to leave them a better world, a better country, a better state and a better city.

Most gun dealers follow the law and run honest businesses. But the statistics show that 1 percent of dealers sell more than half of all illegal guns. Why isn't the federal government going after them? Here's one reason: unlike mayors, members of Congress don't get a phone call in the middle of the night when a cop is shot and killed. They don't deliver the eulogies.

You know, I start with the assumption that -or with, with the belief that this president has to succeed. We all have an enormous amount of capital invested in his success. His success is the country's success.

Ironically, it is exactly because we are a city that embraces freedom, that welcomes everyone and encourages their dreams, that New York remains on the front lines in the war on terror.

I'm not going to run for president. No way, no how.

If you are honest with yourself and if you want to like what you see in the mirror, is you have to say what you really believe.

Government by three men in a room has turned New York State into a national symbol of governmental dysfunction. Enough is enough!

I think we are not serious about attacking the long-term debt problem, and that's one of the things that he's going to have to find a way to get on the agenda.

Organizing around a common interest is a fundamental part of democracy. We should no more try to take away the right of individuals to collectively bargain than we should try to take away the right to a secret ballot.

What chance does a five-foot-seven billionaire Jew who's divorced really have of becoming president?

We will go forward ... we will never go back.

If people are not smoking, they'll probably be drinking more.

Well, you have the public not wanting any new spending, you have the Republicans not wanting any new taxes, you have the Democrats not wanting any new spending cuts, you have the markets not wanting any new borrowing, and you have the economists wanting all of the above. And that leads to paralysis.

Leading from the front: It's what built America. But these days, the federal government isn't at the front - it's cowering in the back corner of the room, ducking responsibility and hoping no one notices.

Nobody wants a job where they don't have authority to go along with the responsibility. Quite the contrary. The more authority you give people, the better people you can attract, and the harder they're going to work, and the more loyal they are going to be.

There is no accountability today ... no willingness to focus on big ideas.

Many of America's and New York's sons and daughters are around the world fighting for the freedoms that the Statue of Liberty stands for.

If you think of all the publicity about the terrible tragedy of Virginia Tech, we have a Virginia Tech in this country every day. It's just spread across 50 states.

Working collectively and collaboratively is the difference between mediocrity by yourself or success as a team. You have to share the pain and the responsibility and if you do then you will also share in the rewards.

When I came into office, people said, 'Billionaire? How do they live? What do they eat? How do they sleep?' Today, they see me on the subway coming uptown. A couple of people say hi, some people smile and nod. Some people just sleep. It's not an issue.

When you come in to court as a plaintiff or as a defendant, it is terribly important that you look up at the bench and feel that that person represents you and will understand you, that that person is reflective of our community and of our society.

What the Democrats have to understand is that while we do need to reform our regulation and we do need more restrictions, it is true that it is capitalism and free enterprise and companies that create jobs and wealth for every American.

We have to get control of our borders. You can only do that if you make companies obey the law and not hire undocumented or illegals. They can only do that is if they have a Social Security Card that has biometrics so they know whether the person is legal or not.

I do not think that anybody should get paid for lousy performance. I've said that for a long time. If you work hard and you do good, you get paid well.

We can only create good jobs if we make smarter investments in infrastructure and do more to support small businesses, not stiff them.

Like Israel, New York City's history has been defined by immigrants who come in search of freedom and the opportunity to build a better life. And like Israel, New York City has remained a target for terrorists who seek to destroy that freedom

You know, if you look back in the 1930s, the money went to infrastructure. The bridges, the municipal buildings, the roads, those were all built with stimulus money spent on infrastructure. This stimulus bill has fundamentally gone, started out with a $500 rebate check, remember. That went to buy flat-screen TVs made in China.

In the game of life, when the final buzzer sounds, the only stat you carry with you is the number of assists you made.

Taxes are not good things, but if you want services, somebody's got to pay for them so they're a necessary evil.

You can't sit there and worry about everything.

Five years have come, and five years have gone, and still we stand together as one. We come back to this place to remember the heartbreaking anniversary - and each person who died here - those known and unknown to us, whose absence is always with us.

You must first be willing to fail - and you must have the courage to go for it anyway.

This is the city of dreamers and time and again it's the place where the greatest dream of all, the American dream, has been tested and has triumphed.

Partisanship may be King in Washington - but the rest of us don't have to pay tribute.

The truth of the matter is: you can create a great legacy, and inspire others, by giving it to philanthropic organizations.

America is the greatest country on Earth - and when people vote with their feet, they come here.

We all know that election reform takes time. That's because those who have benefited from the system are the ones who fight hardest to preserve it. So if we're going to succeed, we need an independent coalition of citizens who believe in reform, who believe that our election laws should treat every voter equally, who believe that low levels of competition and participation are not healthy for democracy. The Independence Party is helping to build that coalition and I am happy to join you in doing so.

On Sept. 11, 2001, thousands of first responders heroically rushed to the scene and saved tens of thousands of lives. More than 400 of those first responders did not make it out alive. In rushing into those burning buildings, not one of them asked, 'What God do you pray to?' What beliefs do you hold?'

We are the safest large city in America, but any crime rate is too high.

We have an expression in New York City government - "In God we trust, but for everyone else, bring data." It's so easy to pick up a sound byte and say, "Oh, yeah, yeah, I believe that," without really thinking.

And if I were the president, I'd go out there and I'd emphasize the things I have done, and I'd say, 'Some things haven't worked, and I'm sorry about that, but I keep trying.' And I'm - and I think the president is a very viable candidate, and you're going to have a real horse race here no matter who the Republican nominee is.

If it wasn't for O'Flanagan's Pub on Manhattan's Upper East Side, I don't know where I would have spent my Friday nights as a young man.

I think if you look at people, whether in business or government, who haven't had any moral compass, who've just changed to say whatever they thought the popular thing was, in the end they're losers.

Nobody is going to delegate a lot of power to a secretary that they can't control.

When the Founding Fathers arrived here in Philadelphia to forge a new nation, they didn't come as Democrats or Republicans or to nominate a presidential candidate. They came as patriots who feared party politics.

I have the best job I could possibly have.

In business, when you fail at something, when something doesn't work, you say okay, we've learned that that's not a path to go down.

I am what I am and, you know, I'm a very lucky guy.

Buy what's deliverable, not what could be.

You're entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts.

Stubborn isn't a word I would use to describe myself; pigheaded is more appropriate.

I'd be happy to provide advice if anybody asked me no matter who the President is.

There is no business in America that would be prevented from taking results into account when making personnel decisions.

The public is mad, frustrated, but what the public wants is progress.

Look, we live in a very dangerous world. We know there are people who want to take away our freedoms. New Yorkers probably know that as much if not more than anybody else after the terrible tragedy of 9/11.

I am heading straight in. I have earned my place in heaven. It's not even close.

If you really believe that you're making a difference and that you can leave a legacy of better schools and jobs and safer streets, why would you not spend the money? The objective is to improve the schools, bring down crime, build affordable housing, clean the streets - not to have a fair fight.

You have to take away some of tax breaks for the wealthy, and you have to cut back on some entitlements. Because, unless we do all of these things, it just doesn't work. And what's good theater and what's good politics isn't necessarily good economic policy.

People use so much more health care when they live longer.

There will be ups, there will be downs, there will be sideways. I can just tell you I have been hired, I have been fired, I have been lauded, I have been vilified. I've said some of the most brilliant things that just by accident appeared on my tongue, and I've said some of the dumbest things that you could imagine. But each day - even the day that I knew I was going to be fired - I looked forward to because I've always believed that tomorrow was going to be the best day of my life.

The World Trade Center site will forever hold a special place in our city, in our hearts. But we would be untrue to the best part of ourselves and who we are as New Yorkers and Americans if we said no to a mosque in lower Manhattan.

Our goal here in New York is to ensure that every child who graduates high school is ready to start a career or start college and to dramatically increase the number of students that graduate from college.

One's a dog-eat-dog world, and the other one's just the opposite.

My personal view is, why don't you get out there and try to do something about the things that you don't like, create the jobs that we are lacking, rather than just yell and scream. But if you want to yell and scream, we'll make sure you can do it.

Throughout our history each and every generation has expanded upon the freedoms won by their parents and grandparents. Each and every generation has removed some of the barriers to full participation in the American dream. And the next great barrier standing before our generation is the prohibition on marriage for same-sex couples

Our climate is changing. And while the increase in extreme weather we have experienced in New York City and around the world may or may not be the result of it, the risk that it may be - given the devastation it is wreaking - should be enough to compel all elected leaders to take immediate action.

In 1975, Congress passed a law requiring fuel efficiency standards to double over 10 years, with incremental targets that auto manufacturers were required to meet. That was the responsible approach, and it worked. But since 1985, we've done nothing - even as technology has moved at light speed.

The cold harsh reality is that we have to balance the budget.

You are safer here tonight than you would be on the streets of any other city in the world.

I believe in Judaism, I was raised a Jew, I'm happy to be one - or proud to be one.

The politics of partisanship and the resulting inaction and excuses have paralyzed decision-making, primarily at the federal level, and the big issues of the day are not being addressed, leaving our future in jeopardy.

I know that many Irish-born New Yorkers are caught in the trap of our federal immigration policies. If we are going to continue to attract the best and the brightest - and Ireland has more than its fair share - we need to inject some common sense into our immigration laws, and I'm doing my best to make that case in Washington.

What you've got to do is be honest. Say what you believe. Give it to them straight. Just don't wuss out.

The next day after I got fired, literally the next day, I started a new company.

You know, if it's a three-way race, the public has more choice than if it's a two-way race, and has more choice in a two-way race than a one-way race.

We can only solve our biggest problems if we come together and embrace the freedoms that our Founding Fathers established right here in Philadelphia, which permitted our ancestors to create the great American exceptionalism that all of us now enjoy.

We need people from all around the world. We need entrepreneurs, we need students that we're educating in our schools that we then throw out and we should make sure they can stay here. If we don't have the new flux of immigrants, nobody's going to create the jobs for the Americans who are currently out of work.

We would betray our values and play into our enemies' hands if we were to treat Muslims differently than anyone else. In fact, to cave to popular sentiment would be to hand a victory to the terrorists, and we should not stand for that.

We cannot continue. Our pension costs and health care costs for our employees are going to bankrupt this city.

Basically, the UBR is a relic of an earlier vision for UDDI. The original vision for UDDI was as a standard that would help companies conduct business with each other in an automated fashion. The idea was that companies could publish how they wanted to interact, and other companies could find that information and use it to establish a relationship.

Neither party has God on its side, a monopoly on good ideas, or a lock on any single fiscal, social, or moral philosophy.

I will say that walking down the street, getting on the subway, taking the elevator, if there's one or two people and they say, 'Great job, Mayor,' that is a real turn-on. I mean, anybody that wouldn't find that satisfying, rewarding, exciting, thrilling - I think they should see the doctor.

The level of analysis that is done when you see laws created, whether it's the city or state or federal level - it's much more horse-trading than analysis.

We need our president to be successful because our futures are all tied to the success of America, which means America's government, which means, in essence, the president.

Government should not tell you what to do unless there's a compelling public purpose.

My father, a bookkeeper who never earned more than $11,000 a year in his life, sat there, writing out a $25 check to the NAACP. When I asked him why, he said discrimination against anyone is discrimination against us all. And I never forgot that. Indeed, his philanthropy was a gift, not just to that organization, but to me.

We can be certain that cities around the world will compete for the jobs that the next revival of the financial services industry will bring.

Every one of my positions cuts - out half the country. I'm pro-choice, I'm pro-gay rights, I'm pro-immigration, I'm against guns, I believe in Darwin.

Nobody should ever mistake and think that our country [USA] is weakened, or that authority is diffuse and unspecified, and that we are vulnerable.

The one thing computers have done is let us make bigger mistakes. We have to be careful not to depend on our machines.

In New York City, a lot of people think 'the great outdoors' is the area between your front door and a taxi cab.

Nobody's going to elect me president of the United States.