Economic growth and environmental protection are not at odds. They're opposite sides of the same coin if you're looking at longer-term prosperity.
Henry Paulson
In just about every area of society, there's nothing more important than ethics.
When you have a big, ugly problem, there's never going to be a neat, elegant solution that is totally painless or without a cost.
Regulation needs to catch up with innovation.
I'm a straightforward person. I like to be direct with people.
I see nothing easy in Washington. I see either analytically simple things that are politically complex or those that are politically complex and analytically complex. I mean, look at immigration reform, you know? It is, I think, analytically easy, but politically very, very complex and very difficult.
If you've got a bazooka, and people know you've got it, you may not have to take it out.
As a Christian Scientist, I don't go to doctors and get diagnoses.
There is a very real danger that financial regulation will become a wolf in sheep's clothing.
Foreclosure is to no one's benefit. I've heard estimates that mortgage investors lose 40 to 50 percent on their investment if it goes into foreclosure.
Complexity and interconnectedness matter as much as size in assessing risk in banking.
If the financial system collapses, it's really, really hard to put it back together again.
As long as I can remember, I had a strong interest in fishing, and my parents, even though they had never fished or camped, took us on canoe camping trips in the wilderness of Quetico Provincial Park in Ontario, Canada, where I could fish to my heart's content.
One of the things I enjoy the most is fishing.
I have relied on prayer for health care all of my life.
Sovereign wealth fund money should be welcomed. The only way not to welcome that money is when it's politically driven.
I never once considered that it was appropriate to put taxpayer money on the line in resolving Lehman Brothers.
China and the U.S. are the two largest importers of oil. They are the two largest emitters of carbon.
Moral hazard is something I don't take lightly.
After I left Treasury, I think in some ways it was harder to sit there and be writing my book... listening to all the criticism.
We need a new tax system. We need entitlement reform. We need immigration reform. These are not easy things. But it is going to take our political system working better.
I'm telling you that there is no silver bullet to keep home prices from going down or to prevent all foreclosures.
In my experience, the most effective professionals in business and government have the ability to get things done. They're trained to work with multiple stakeholders, to understand how to identify a problem, devise solutions, to compromise and work well with others.
China saves too much, produces too much, sells too much to Americans and consumes too little.
From the beginning of time, we've had financial crises. People always blame the banks and for good reason. When you look for the root causes, they're almost always failed government policies.
I've always said to everyone that ever worked for me, if you get too dug in on a position, the facts change, and you don't change to adapt to the facts, you will never be successful.
A Fed loan to Lehman Brothers would not have prevented a bankruptcy.
Every good businessman or woman carefully analyzes all the available facts before making a decision.
I happen to think that global slowdown, the slowdown in investment, strengthening dollar probably provide more of a headwind than we get from the decline in oil prices.
I'll be voting for Hillary Clinton, with the hope that she can bring Americans together to do the things necessary to strengthen our economy, our environment, and our place in the world.
What I've said repeatedly is, 'I think the auto industry is a very important industry.'
I've long believed the environmental issue is an economic issue and a political issue. The three are entwined. You can't build prosperity on any basis other than a long-term basis, and you can't do that if you don't have a healthy environment.
China needs a currency that reflects underlying economic fundamentals.
China's growth and stability is a vital issue for all nations.
I've been through periods of stress, turbulence in the market for over the course of my career, various times, and never in any of those other periods have we had the advantage of a strong economy underpinning the markets.
I have always tried to live by the philosophy that when there is a big problem that needs fixing, you should run towards it, rather than away from it.
When the economy is growing, there's a lot that can be done to deal with the deficit.
It is important that China stop its over-reliance on municipal debt to finance infrastructure. I take comfort in the fact that China's leaders understand this.
For decades, Indians have immigrated to the United States, joined our communities, and raised their families while maintaining their cultural heritage.
I think all governments engage in intelligence gathering vis-a-vis other governments.
We've had crooks from the beginning of time... it's always very interesting and troubling why good people do bad things.
Let's not forget, what TARP did allowed us to move overnight and put capital into hundreds of banks, and that money came back plus $32 billion.
An open, competitive, and liberalized financial market can effectively allocate scarce resources in a manner that promotes stability and prosperity far better than governmental intervention.
A state-based regulatory system is quite burdensome. It allows price controls to create market distortions. It can hinder development of national products and can directly impact the competitiveness of U.S. insurers.
I grew up on a working farm. It was small, a hundred acres, but we had cows and pigs and chickens and sheep and a vegetable garden. I spent hours pulling weeds, hoeing, feeding the horses, cleaning out the stalls. My dad was a tough taskmaster. I always worked, but we also had fun.
For market discipline to constrain risk effectively, financial institutions must be allowed to fail. Under optimal financial regulatory and financial system infrastructures, such a failure would not threaten the overall system.
I believe that the root cause of every financial crisis, the root cause, is flawed government policies.
All of us would like to have our children and their grandchildren grow up with at least the level of prosperity that we had. In the U.S., we seem to be very selfish because the older generation is not making the sacrifices.
It's hard to punish and save the banks at the same time.
What began as a subprime lending problem has spread to other, less risky mortgages and contributed to excess home inventories that have pushed down home prices for responsible homeowners.
