Ry Cooder Quotes

He is a great simpleton who imagines that the chief power of wealth is to supply wants. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred it creates more wants than it supplies.

I don't understand this pathetic need for luxuries.

I had the notion that, OK, so now we have all of this wealth, we could buy not only one expensive car, we could buy all of them. As soon as you realize that you could buy all of them, then none of them are particularly interesting or satisfying.

As human beings, we're very materialistic and have all this stuff - furs and cars and diamonds and money.

The media is convincing people that if you have that 'next thing,' that diamond, the right car, then you'd be happier.

Human nature doesn't change. When enough people are comfortable enough financially, there is going to be human nature that wants to spend more money on better quality and, to some degree, status symbols as well.

Of prosperity mortals can never have enough.

I didn't think about money or cars or anything like that.

You know when you first get rich, and you, like, just buy everything that you see? I did that for several years. And I have sheds full of things, maybe sometimes nine copies of the same thing.

The more money an American accumulates, the less interesting he becomes.

Poverty wants some, luxury many, and avarice all things.

To be rich nowadays merely means to possess a large number of poor objects.

We've been raised to compete, to want more! More! More! It's a way of life. It's about greed.

When I was a child, I was very poor and wanted everything. So when I got money, I began buying things.

Buy what thou hast no need of and ere long thou shalt sell thy necessities.

Oh Lord, won't you buy me a Mercedes Benz.

I always tried to live my life as though nothing changed. People would say, 'You can have a Rolls-Royce'. I'd say to that, 'What do I want with a Rolls-Royce when I can have a Volkswagen or a bike?' Some people get carried away with the juice.

I got a bit enamoured with bigger houses and things like that.

You can never be too rich or too thin.

In the affluent society no useful distinction can be made between luxuries and necessaries.

I try to educate people about materialism through my work. I try to show them real visual luxury.

After I had money, I realized about all that all the things I thought I wanted that I don't need a lot of stuff. If there's anything I get excited by, it's a nice car.

We always want more. Whether it is better clothes, a bigger house, faster cars, or the latest gadgets, satisfaction in these days of consumerism is difficult to find.

I'm not a materialistic person at all, but I always want the next thing; I've got a nice toolbox, but I still want another set of spanners.

Money is much more exciting than anything it buys.