Henry Paulson

Moral hazard is something I don't take lightly.

I've got to say our banking system is a safe and a sound one. And since the days when we've had federal deposit insurance in place, we haven't had a depositor who's got less than $100,000 in an account lose a penny. So the American people can be very, very confident about their accounts in our banking system.

The idea of being Treasury secretary in the abstract appealed to me, but my initial inclination was that it wasn't right for me to take that step.

I was secretary of the Treasury in 2008. In that role, I had the privilege to work with many talented men and women in government and the private sector who labored to pull our nation back from the brink of disaster.

All of us would like to have our children and their grandchildren grow up with at least the level of prosperity that we had. In the U.S., we seem to be very selfish because the older generation is not making the sacrifices.

I'm a straightforward person. I like to be direct with people.

A Fed loan to Lehman Brothers would not have prevented a bankruptcy.

I hope to help the Indian government advance their economic reform agenda, which will benefit India's citizens and the world.

The most pressing and significant problems in the global economy are unsustainable structural issues with regard to the E.U. - fiscal deficits and the structure of the E.U. itself.

Frankly I'm a bit concerned when it comes to U.S.-China relations.

China saves too much, produces too much, sells too much to Americans and consumes too little.

The cheapest and cleanest energy is the energy you don't use.

I never once considered that it was appropriate to put taxpayer money on the line in resolving Lehman Brothers.

As our relationship with China grows and matures, tensions will naturally emerge.

Predators, they're the best coal miners' canary. When they're gone, you've got a sick ecosystem.

After I left Treasury, I think in some ways it was harder to sit there and be writing my book... listening to all the criticism.

I grew up on a farm - I know the smell of horse manure. It does smell better than pig manure.

From the beginning of time, we've had financial crises. People always blame the banks and for good reason. When you look for the root causes, they're almost always failed government policies.

Every American business, from the biggest companies to small hardware companies, need money to flow through the system not only to create new jobs but to sustain existing jobs.

I am suspicious of career engineers, people that plan it out every step of the way.