John Templeton on poverty and wealth creation

The conditions in the world today and throughout history show that many nations and their people remain impoverished because they neglect the principles of wealth accumulation - or because of the flight of capital into safer places.  There are many examples of great poverty in otherwise rich lands, poverty arising because government alone owns almost all the wealth and neglects to stimulate entrepreneurship.  I have observed that encouraging individuals to accumulate wealth brings both prosperity to nations and happiness to workers.  That, I believe, is the major lesson in economics of the past.

~ John Templeton, Looking Forward: The Next Forty Years, 1993, pp 90-91