Michael

“But a theory is not like an airline or bus timetable. We are not interested simply in the accuracy of its predictions. A theory also serves as a base for thinking. It helps us to understand what is going on by enabling us to organize our thoughts. Faced with a choice between a theory which predicts well but gives us little insight into how the system works and one which gives us this insight but predicts badly, I would choose the latter, and I am inclined to think that most economists would do the same.”
― Ronald H. Coase, Essays on Economics and Economists

“Management by drive, like management by ‘bellows and meat ax,’ is a sure sign of confusion. It is an admission of incompetence. It is a sign that management does not know how to plan. But, above all, it is a sign that the company does not know what to expect of its managers – that, not knowing how to direct them, it misdirects them.”
― Peter F. Drucker, The Essential Drucker

“The laws of economics are to be compared with the laws of the tides, rather than with the simple and exact law of gravitation. For the actions of men are so various and uncertain, that the best statement of tendencies, which we can make in a science of human conduct, must needs be inexact and faulty.”
― Alfred Marshall, Principles of Economics

“Most people do not pretend to be physicists. Few of us doctor our own illnesses. When we have to cope with the problems of physics or chemistry, we call in the experts. But we all feel that we are economists...the point is that only rarely does the man in the street admit to ignorance on matters of economic policy.”
― Lorie Tarshis