These Labor quotes will inspire you. Work or labor is an intentional activity that people do to support themselves, others, or the needs and desires of a broader community. Alternatively, labor can be viewed as the human activity that contributes (along with other factors of production) to goods and services within an economy.
Below you will find a collection of motivating, knowledgeable and encouraging labor quotes, labor sayings, and labor proverbs.
Inspirational Labor Quotes
- “If a man loves the labor of his trade, apart from any question of success or fame, the gods have called him.” ~ Robert Louis Stevenson
- “Labour was the first price, the original purchase-money that was paid for all things. It was not by gold or by silver, but by labor, that all wealth of the world was originally purchased.” ~ Adam Smith
- “There can be no rise in the value of labor
without a fall of profits.” ~ David Ricardo -
“Labour markets are about people. And people have a right to be treated with dignity and respect.” ~ Juan Somavia
- “A mind always employed is always happy. This is the true secret, the grand recipe, for felicity.” ~ Thomas Jefferson
- “You don’t get paid for the hour. You get paid for the value you bring to the hour.” ~ Jim Rohn
- “Labor was the first price, the original purchase-money that was paid for all things.” ~ Adam Smith
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“Thou, O God, dost sell us all good things at the price of labor.” ~ Leonardo da Vinci
- “The annual labor of every nation is the fund which originally supplies it with all the necessaries and conveniences of life which it annually consumes, and which consist always either in the immediate produce of that labor, or in what is purchased with that produce from other nations.” ~ Adam Smith
- “Labor is prior to and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
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“To create a little flower is the labor of ages.” ~ William Blake
- “Enable every woman who can work to take her place on the labor front, under the principle of equal pay for equal work.” ~ Mao Zedong
- “No one can travel so far that he does not make some progress each day. So let us never give up. Then we shall move forward daily in the Lord’s way. And let us never despair because of our limited success. Even though it is so much less than we would like, our labor is not wasted when today is better than yesterday!” ~ John Calvin
- “I think the truth is that the Labour Party isn’t believed anymore because people suspect it will say anything to get votes. The rebuilding of some radical alternatives to Thatcherism – and by that I mean all-party Thatcherism – will require us to do some very difficult things” ~ Tony Benn
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“All labor is directed towards producing some effect.” ~ Alfred Marshall
- “We must ensure that while eliminating child labor in the export industry, we are also eliminating their labor from the informal sector, which is more invisible to public scrutiny – and thus leaves the children more open to abuse and exploitation.” ~ Carol Bellamy
- “Let us remember that the automatic machine is the precise economic equivalent of slave labor. Any labor which competes with slave labor must accept the economic consequences of slave labor.” ~ Norbert Wiener, Labor quotes machines
- “Your corn is ripe today; mine will be so tomorrow. ‘Tis profitable for us both, that I should labor with you today, and that you should aid me tomorrow.” ~ David Hume
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“The change starts within each one of us. And ends only when all children are free to be children” ~ Craig Kielburger
- “We must elevate the craft, protect its interests, advance wages, reduce the hours of labor, spread correct economic doctrines, and cultivate a spirit of fraternity among the working people regardless of creed, color, nationality, or politics. These principles are the foundation principles of our organization.” ~ Peter J. McGuire
- “When a man tells you that he got rich through hard work, ask him whose. There’s no evidence that more people with more skills would produce more jobs. There’s a great deal of evidence that they produce more competition for the jobs that exist, and in turn, drive down the cost of labor. Nothing pleases a corporation more than having five people compete for the same job. Competitiveness means good times for machines, not workers, because our tax systems privilege machines over workers.A lost job can put a smile on any shareholder’s face.” ~ Eric Reguly
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“Learn to labor and to wait.” ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
- “The evil that has resulted from the error of the schools, in teaching natural philosophy as an accomplishment only, has been that of generating in the pupils a species of atheism. Instead of looking through the works of creation to the Creator himself, they stop short and employ the knowledge they acquire to create doubts of his existence. They labor with studied ingenuity to ascribe everything they behold to innate properties of matter and jump over all the rest by saying, that matter is eternal.” ~ Thomas Paine
- “I believe the prayers of 30 years ago are not lost. We may not see the results of our labour or sacrifice immediately, but in due time they will produce much fruit.” ~ T. B. Joshua
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“If little labor, little are our gains: Man’s fortunes are according to his pains.” ~ Robert Herrick
- “Eight hours daily labor is enough for any human being, and under proper arrangements sufficient to afford an ample supply of food, raiment, and shelter, or the necessaries and comforts of life, and for the remainder of his time, every person is entitled to education, recreation, and sleep.” ~ Robert Owen, Daily labor quotes
- “And, inasmuch [as] most good things are produced by labor, it follows that all such things of right belong to those whose labor has produced them. But it has so happened in all ages of the world, that some have labored, and others have, without labor, enjoyed a large proportion of the fruits. This is wrong, and should not continue. To [secure] to each laborer, the whole product of his labor, or as nearly as possible, is a most worthy object of any good government.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
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“The lowest stage of humanity is experienced when the individual must labor for a small pittance of wages from others.” ~ Robert Owen
- “If at any time all labor should cease, and all existing provisions be equally divided among the people, at the end of a single year there could scarcely be one human being left alive–all would have perished by want of subsistence.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
- “The problem is capitalism. The problem is that in order to sell seven billion people on the necessity of globalization, we’ve created a moral universe where people who do not work to create profit are considered less than human, and used as surplus labor to drive down the cost of wages.” ~ Laurie Penny, Capitalism labor quotes
- “The fabric of a mighty state, which has been reared by the labors of successive ages, could not be overturned by the misfortune of a single day if the fatal power of the imagination did not exaggerate the real measure of the calamity.” ~ Edward Gibbon
- “Today’s workplace has become heartless and soulless. Employees are seen as units of labor, automatons, functionaries, objects for achieving designated tasks, and as costs to be minimized.” ~ Tim Field
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“A little labor, much health.” ~ George Herbert
- “Judge yourself and beware of passing judgment on others. In judging others we expend our energy to no purpose; we are often mistaken and easily sin. But if we judge ourselves our labor is always to our profit.” ~ Thomas a Kempis
- “If by gaining knowledge we destroy our health, we labor for a thing that will be useless in our hands.” ~ John Locke
- “Ants are so much like human beings as to be an embarrassment. They farm fungi, raise aphids as livestock, launch armies into wars, use chemical sprays to alarm and confuse enemies, capture slaves… They do everything but watch television.” ~ Lewis Thomas
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“Labour Party members must all be free to criticize and oppose injustice and abuse wherever we find it.” ~ Jeremy Corbyn
- “Government cannot do it all. As we work hard to break welfare dependency and get young people ready for the labor market, we need businesses to give them a chance and not just fall back on labor from abroad.” ~ Iain Duncan Smith
- “…180 million kids are engaged in the worst forms of child labor. Put it all together and it is not only morally unacceptable but politically dangerous.” ~ Juan Somavia
- “The trouble with the Labour Party leadership and the trade union leadership, they’re quite willing to applaud millions on the streets of the Philippines or in Eastern Europe, without understanding the need to also produce millions of people on the streets of Britain.” ~ Arthur Scargill, Labor quotes for union
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“Nobody can guarantee the real terms per pupil funding increase. In the Labour party’s manifesto, we know the figures don’t add up.” ~ Theresa May
- “A firm, for instance, that does business in many countries of the world is driven to spend an enormous amount of time, labor, and money in providing for translation services.” ~ Edward Sapir
- “As you know, the Australian Labour Party is committed to turning the country into a republic. We’ve not stipulated a timeline for doing that. We are sensitive to the other priorities we’ve got as a nation and in the world, but in time the country will head in that direction.” ~ Kevin Rudd
- “As to happiness in this life, it is hardly compatible with that diminished respect which ever attends the relinquishing of labor.” ~ Anthony Trollope
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“We all labor against our own cure, for death is the cure of all diseases.” ~ Thomas Browne
- “I came back from university thinking I knew all about politics and racism, not knowing my dad had been one of the youngest-serving Labour councilors in the town and had refused to work in South Africa years ago because of the situation there. And he’s never mentioned it – you just find out. That’s a real man to me. A sleeping lion.” ~ Johnny Vegas
- “In individual industries where female labor pays an important role, any movement advocating better wages, shorter working hours, etc., would not be doomed from the start because of the attitude of those women workers who are not organized.” ~ Clara Zetkin
- “What made women’s labor particularly attractive to the capitalists was not only its lower price but also the greater submissiveness of women.” ~ Clara Zetkin
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“I have considered voting Conservative because I am so against the Labour party.” ~ Vivienne Westwood
- “The American Dream, coupled with government subsidies of utilities and cheap consumer goods courtesy of slave labor somewhere else, has kept the poor huddled masses from rising up.” ~ Elizabeth Wurtzel
- “My first vote was for a communist in east London when I was a medical student. But I’ve voted Tory, Labour, and Lib Dem in my time.” ~ Robert Winston
- “Wisdom alone is true ambition’s aim, wisdom is the source of virtue and of fame; obtained with labor, for mankind employed, and then, when most you share it, best enjoyed.” ~ Alfred North Whitehead
- “To say of a picture, as is often said in its praise, that it shows great and earnest labor, is to say that it is incomplete and unfit for view.” ~ James Whistler
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“What people should understand is that I adore the Labour party.” ~ Tony Blair
- “The capitalist system is about taking from the Earth and from the other great commodity, labor. What’s happening with this system is that the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer, and the only way out of it is supposed to be growth. But growth is debt. It’s going to make the situation worse.” ~ Vivienne Westwood
- “My mom used to make everything. She had a great garden and composted and made everything from scratch – peanut butter, bread, jelly, everything. I don’t know how she did it because all those things take time and love and labor. I only do half the stuff she does – but there’s still time.” ~ Julia Roberts
- “I find it weird that people who claim to speak for the prisoners basically want to keep them in cages all the time – and then they’ll fight for better prison libraries or whatever. It’s like they’re missing the big picture. If I were in prison, of course, I would prefer to be outside doing physical labor. It’s not physical labor but prison life that kills a person. It’s so bad inside that the outside jobs are often sought after. So, yeah, call them work crews and let them do it. At the same time, the retributive side can feel the cons are being punished.” ~ Peter Moskos
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“Remember the No campaign is Conservative people, Labour people, people of no party.” ~ William Hague
- “When you cease from labor, fill up your time in reading, meditation, and prayer: and while your hands are laboring, let your heart be employed, as much as possible, in divine thoughts.” ~ David Brainerd, Labor quotes employed
- “I’m going to reduce the size of the Cabinet, cut the number of ministers, reduce the size of the House of Commons, campaign for a European Parliament with 100 fewer members, halve the number of political advisers, and abolish a huge swathe of Labour’s regional bureaucracies – and agencies and their offices in Brussels.” ~ William Hague
- “Liberals in the US don’t have great passions about Margaret Thatcher. Conservatives do. For all the worship that Ronald Reagan elicits in conservative circles in the US, I would venture that Thatcher did far more to reshape British society than Reagan did here. When I moved to Britain, the utilities were state-run. By the time I left, most of that was privatized. Thatcher had broken the miners’ union, all but crushed the Labour Party, cut back the welfare state, even flirted with a poll tax. In the circles I ran in, Reagan was mocked as a childish dolt. Thatcher was despised.” ~ Jon Weisman
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“In a way, I’m almost more rueful about the notion of having a non-ideological Labour party than I am about the personality of Tony Blair.” ~ Robert Harris
- “An influential member of parliament has not only to pay much money to become such, and to give time and labor, he has also to sacrifice his mind too – at least all the characteristics part of it that which is original and most his own.” ~ Walter Bagehot
- “And some of what we’re doing in Government even now, some of the welfare reform programs that are helping lone mothers come into work are based on things that were very new under the Labour Government in the eighties.” ~ Patricia Hewitt
- “You get people talking about being worried about their art, and dances… their culture being wiped out or taken over, and yet these same people are taking advantage of their people to use them as cheap labor.” ~ Arlo Guthrie
