Amity Shlaes

"With demands for special education or standardized test prep being shouted in their ears, public schools can't always hear a parent when he says: 'I want my child to be able to write contracts in Spanish,' or, 'I want my child to shake hands firmly,' or, 'I want my child to study statistics and accounting, not calculus."

"The phrase 'perception is reality' is overused generally. But perception can be reality in monetary policy. The bond market doesn't act merely on what it sees. It acts on what it expects of the Fed or the government."

"Anything can be done if you find friends to do it with. The lucky biographers find themselves drawn into a sort of friendship with their subject."

"There's something unsettling about the education of a child who comfortably enumerates the rules for surviving zombie apocalypse but finds it uncomfortable to enumerate the rules of his grandparents' faith, if he knows them."

"The donning of the ear buds marks the beginning of teen life, when children set off on their own for the passage through adolescence."

"Grades can matter, especially for those students and parents who live for the next round of applications to graduate or professional schools. But there's a problem with the grade emphasis. Math or science graduates earn more than students majoring in the humanities."

"Anyone who experienced World War I close-hand was grossed out by it forever. It just was so awful."