Ko Wen-je Quotes

Administration is the essence of government, and its quality is a prime condition of civic comfort.

Our battle over the size of the state overlooks a problem that is just as important and that may be easier to muster the collective will to resolve: how effective government is, regardless of its scale.

We don't need more government, we just need the government we have to work smarter and more efficiently.

The goal to strive for is a poor government but a rich people.

Good government only happens when the people working in it do their jobs, and do them well.

While other state governments stiff their vendors, close parks, delay tax refunds, and ignore unacceptably poor service levels, Indiana state employees are setting national standards for efficiency.

The State of Virginia is similar to a great business corporation... and should be conducted with the same efficiency and economy as any private business.

For some in Washington, it's become sport to pick on the federal workforce. I think they do so unjustly. The very foundation of a stable America is having a government that functions well. Many countries have dysfunctional governments, because they don't have a good government workforce.

We are living in an era of transformation where we will all have to reckon with a number of revolutionary changes and challenges for the public sector. In the move towards globalization, the public is becoming more and more knowledgeable about their rights and requirements. As such, the need to revisit our traditional ways of offering public services is inescapable, if we want to ensure the establishment of a more caring public service.

With bad laws and good civil servants it's still possible to govern. But with bad civil servants even the best laws can't help.

The skills and productivity of American Workers, .... are the greatest economic resource our country has.

The question of our time is rapidly becoming can government get things done?

The object sought to be accomplished is the improvement of the condition of man. The mode by which it is to be accomplished is that of increasing his productive power. The more food a man can raise, the more and better food may he consume, and the larger will be the surplus that can be appropriated to the purchase of clothing, to the education of his family, to the enlargement of his house, or to the improvement of his machinery, and the greater will be the amount of leisure that can be appropriated to the improvement of his modes of thought.

What we can do in Singapore may not be doable elsewhere. Some things you know you need: you want efficient government, you want clean government, you want to do away with corruption, you must educate your people. You want to get housing and so on. All these are not such secrets, not so special to Singapore.

I do think there are some irreducible inefficiencies in government. But we still need to have government; we still need to make government effective if we can.

We have a moral duty to have an efficient government.

There is no reason why government should not be as efficient as any good business.

In order to fulfill the aspirations of masses, we have to sharpen the tool called the government machinery: we have to make it keen, more dynamic, and it is in this direction that we are working.

We need to deliver efficient, transparent government.

Keeping government running really well, to me, is incredibly important.

Productivity growth is the only possible way to achieve prosperity.

I don't want to jump the gun, [but] I will tell you, though, that my goal is to have the best possible government.

With few exceptions, democracy has not brought good government to new developing countries. What Asians value may not necessarily be what Americans or Europeans value. Westerners value the freedoms and liberties of the individual. As an Asian of Chinese cultural backround, my values are for a government which is honest, effective and efficient.

...[the federal] government [has no authority] to deliver a service,...and there's no evidence to show that government has ever been efficient [at] delivering...service.

We have come to accept bigger and bigger things as meaning greater and greater efficiency, more and more prosperity and more and more freedom. The two do not go together of necessity.