Joseph Schumpeter

Economics Austrian-American 1883 – 1950 318 quotes

Creative destruction, entrepreneurship theory

Most quoted

"In capitalist reality as distinct from its textbook picture, it is not that kind of competition which counts but the competition from the new commodity, the new technology, the new source of supply, the new type of organization which commands a decisive cost or quality advantage and which strikes not at the margins of the profits and the outputs of the existing firms but at their foundations and their very lives."

— from Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, 1942

"The function of the entrepreneur is to reform or revolutionize the pattern of production by exploiting an invention or, more generally, an untried technological possibility for producing a new commodity or producing an old one in a new way, by opening up a new source of supply of materials or a new outlet for products, by reorganizing an industry and so on."

— from The Theory of Economic Development, 1934

"The opening up of new markets, foreign or domestic, and the organizational development from the craft shop and factory to such concerns as U.S. Steel illustrate the same process of industrial mutation that incessantly revolutionizes the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old one, incessantly creating a new one."

— from Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, 1942

All quotes by Joseph Schumpeter (318)

The capitalist process is a process of incessant renewal.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The entrepreneur is the man who introduces new things.

The Theory of Economic Development 1911

The capitalist system is a system of dynamic change.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy

The capitalist process is a process of incessant development.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The entrepreneur is the man who breaks new ground.

Attributed, but not definitively sourced to his writings

The capitalist process is a process of incessant progress.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The entrepreneur is the man who creates the future.

Attributed, but not definitively sourced to his writings

The capitalist system is a system of continuous transformation.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy

Creative destruction is the essential fact about capitalism. It is what capitalism essentially is.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The entrepreneur is the prime mover in economic development.

The Theory of Economic Development 1911

Socialism is not only possible but also, in a sense, inevitable.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The case for capitalism is not that it is a perfect system, but that it is a progressive one.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The economic process is not a mere circular flow, but an evolutionary process.

Business Cycles: A Theoretical, Historical, and Statistical Analysis of the Capitalist Process 1939

The history of capitalism is a history of innovation and creative destruction.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The entrepreneur is essentially a phenomenon of development, of change, of innovation.

The Theory of Economic Development 1911

The capitalist system is not a stationary process, but a process of incessant change.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The intellectual and moral atmosphere of capitalism is hostile to its own survival.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The very success of capitalism undermines the social institutions which protect it.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942

The entrepreneur is not primarily a risk-bearer but an innovator.

The Theory of Economic Development 1911

The process of creative destruction is the most important single fact about capitalism.

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy 1942