The poor want to be rich, the rich do not want to be poor.
 Victor Hugo, Ninety-Three (1874). copy citation

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Author Victor Hugo
Source Ninety-Three
Topic
Date 1874
Language English
Reference
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Weblink https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Ninety-three

Context

“but the rich have an advantage over us, for they eat every day. Eating preserves one." After a silence, the beggar continued: "Poverty and riches—it is a troublesome problem. That is the cause of calamities. At least, so it seems to me. The poor want to be rich, the rich do not want to be poor. I believe that is at the bottom of it. I don't mix myself up with it. Events are events. I am neither for the debtor nor for the creditor. I know that there is a debt and that it is being paid. That is all.” source