I was born May 31, 1911, in Paris. My parents owned a small cheese shop, and my maternal grandfather was a carpentry worker. I thus came from what is commonly known as the working class. – Maurice Allais
It would be just as pointless to oppose the international use of English today as it would have been to oppose the worldwide use of French in the 18th century. – Maurice Allais
It is understandable that the Fed injects cash to avoid the collapse of the stock market, but basically it is bad policy for monetary authorities to intervene to save speculators from bankruptcy. This is not their role. – Maurice Allais
In August 1914, my father was called to war and then taken prisoner. He died in captivity in Germany on March 27, 1915. My youth – indeed, my entire life – was deeply marked by this, directly and indirectly. – Maurice Allais
I received my high school baccalaureate diploma in Latin and Science in 1928, then my two baccalaureate diplomas in Mathematics and Philosophy in 1929. – Maurice Allais
Fascinated by history during my secondary education, then by physics and mechanics at the Ecole Polytechnique, I finally entered the national administration of mines in 1936. – Maurice Allais
The reality is that the institutional framework in which Wall Street operates is fundamentally inappropriate, and it inevitably generates violent fluctuations of the market. – Maurice Allais
I am not a monetarist, and I am not a Keynesian. On certain points I agree with each. – Maurice Allais
In principle, junk bonds are basically useful, but they are used excessively and irrationally, notably in takeovers. – Maurice Allais
Throughout the years following World War II and until the formation of the European Economic Community in 1958, I was very active as a national or international rapporteur at many of the international conferences aiming to establish an European community. – Maurice Allais
At the beginning of my career, my desire to understand was associated with a profound desire to act, with the wish to influence opinion and policy; but, over the years, this motivation has come to be of secondary importance, far behind my desire to understand. – Maurice Allais
My approach has never been to start from theories to arrive at facts, but on the contrary, to try to bring out from the facts the explanatory thread without which they appear incomprehensible and elude effective action. – Maurice Allais
All science is based on models, and every scientific model comprises three distinct stages: statement of well-defined hypotheses; deduction of all the consequences of these hypotheses, and nothing but these consequences; confrontation of these consequences with observed data. – Maurice Allais
My motivation was an idea of being able to improve the conditions of life, to try to find a remedy to many of the problems facing the world. That’s what led me into economics. I saw it as a way of helping people. – Maurice Allais
