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Who really said it

Even If You Win the Rat Race, You're Still a Rat

Not graffiti in origin — an anonymous 1950s quip Anonymous In circulation by 1956 · coiner unknown
Disputed Rights unconfirmed

The joke was already in print in 1956. A wall-writing version, “Remember, even if you win the rat race—you’re still a rat,” was collected in Robert Reisner’s 1971 anthology Graffiti: Two Thousand Years of Wall Writing. Quote Investigator ↗ concludes the quip “was in circulation by 1956” and does not name a coiner. Graffiti passed it along; graffiti did not invent it.

Last verified 1 Nov 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

For presentations

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Disputed wording — copy with the correction

“Even If You Win the Rat Race, You're Still a Rat” anonymous quip, in circulation by 1956 (Quote Investigator); recorded as graffiti in Robert Reisner, Graffiti: Two Thousand Years of Wall Writing (1971); popularized by Lily Tomlin (People, 26 Dec. 1977). · Verbatim: “Remember, even if you win the rat race—you're still a rat.”

Can you use it?

We couldn’t verify where this wording comes from, so there’s no rights status to give. Safe to present as an unverified or anonymous line — just don’t assert a specific author or source.

Image direction — grounded in this quote’s real context; paste into your image tool

In context

Evoking the themes of success, purpose and work. Theme: "Even If You Win the Rat Race, You're Still a Rat". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Minimalist

Minimalist editorial slide for the quote "Even If You Win the Rat Race, You're Still a Rat". Clean background, a single muted accent color, generous negative space, subtle paper or linen texture, no literal illustration — let the words carry it. Reserve clear space for a serif quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Provenance

Where the graffito version is documented

Work
Graffiti: Two Thousand Years of Wall Writing
Compiler
Robert Reisner
Published
1971
Already in print
1956 (Jim Bishop, The Golden Ham; Boston Herald)

Remember, even if you win the rat race—you’re still a rat.

This is the graffito as Quote Investigator transcribes it from Reisner’s 1971 compilation. The anthology recorded wall writing; it does not say who wrote the line or where it came from.

Quote Investigator: Even If You Win the Rat Race, You’re Still a Rat

How the quip travelled

  • 1956 — Jim Bishop’s The Golden Ham: A Candid Biography of Jackie Gleason prints a Gleason letter: “Television is a rat race, and remember this, even if you win you are still a rat.” This is the earliest appearance known to Quote Investigator ↗.
  • 11 Aug 1956 — In the Boston Herald, Bill Cunningham writes, “like the fellow said, ‘You can win the rat race, but you’re still a rat,’” and claims no credit for it (Barry Popik ↗).
  • 1965 — William Sloane Coffin Jr., writing in Life, quotes a student: “And even if you win a rat race, you’re still a rat.” Russell Baker uses the line in a newspaper satire the same year (Quote Investigator ↗).
  • 1971 & 1977 — Reisner’s Graffiti records the wall version. Then People (26 Dec 1977) quotes Lily Tomlin: “The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win you’re still a rat” (Quote Investigator ↗).

The line is an anonymous quip with no identified author. The graffito wording reached print in Reisner’s 1971 anthology, but that book only collected it. With no known originating work, quotle.info asserts no copyright status, either public domain or protected.

Rights status is our research, not legal advice — and copyright varies by country and edition. For commercial or published use, confirm with the rightsholder. See terms.

Fact-check

Who gets the credit, and why

The joke is anonymous, so it has collected a long list of authors. Some people really used it. None of them can be shown to have coined it.

Graffiti (anonymous wall writing) Carrier, not origin

A graffito version appears in Robert Reisner’s 1971 Graffiti anthology. By then the quip had been in print for more than a decade (Quote Investigator ↗).

Lily Tomlin Popularizer

People quoted her in December 1977, and QI calls her “an important vector for its popularization.” QI also says she used the jest only after it had spread (Quote Investigator ↗). Wikiquote lists her version under material credited to her writer Jane Wagner (Wikiquote ↗).

William Sloane Coffin Jr. Weak claim

Coffin thought he may have coined it as a chaplain in the 1950s or 1960s. QI calls the evidence for this “weak,” and in his 1965 Life piece he put the line in a student’s mouth (Quote Investigator ↗).

Jackie Gleason Used it privately

Gleason applied it to television in a letter printed in 1956. QI says it is not clear whether he ever used it on stage (Quote Investigator ↗).

Banksy Unsourced

Quote sites credit “You can win the rat race but you’re still a rat” to the street artist and give no public source (Quotewise ↗). The joke was in print by 1956, so it is older than his career, and he probably got the credit because the line is linked to graffiti.

No coiner is known. The quip was “in circulation by 1956,” graffiti recorded it in 1971, and Lily Tomlin made it famous (Quote Investigator ↗).

Context

Why it stuck

“Rat race” was mid-century slang for a pointless competitive grind. Wikipedia dates its figurative sense to 1939 (Wikipedia ↗). The punchline takes the metaphor literally: winning does not get you out of it.

A one-liner with no owner moves easily from columnists to campus chaplains, onto walls and into stand-up. Each new voice gets credited along the way. That is why graffiti, Tomlin, Coffin, Gleason and Banksy all show up as “the author” of a joke that none of them can be shown to have invented.

Remember, even if you win the rat race—you’re still a rat.

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Success Purpose Work

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Quote Investigatorquoteinvestigator.com

The main investigation: dated citations from 1956 onward and the conclusion that no coiner is known.
Barry Popikbarrypopik.com

Independent list of citations, including the 1956 Boston Herald column and the 1971 graffito.
Wikiquote: Lily Tomlinen.wikiquote.org

Lists Tomlin’s version under material credited to her writer Jane Wagner.
Wikipedia: Rat raceen.wikipedia.org

History of the phrase “rat race,” including the Gleason line from 1956.

The author

About Anonymous

Anonymous

Anonymous quip · in circulation by 1956

Nobody has identified who first said this. Quote Investigator finds it in 1956: in a Jackie Gleason letter printed in Jim Bishop’s biography The Golden Ham, and in a Boston Herald sports column where Bill Cunningham credited “the fellow.” The joke later reached walls, sermons and stand-up comedy. Lily Tomlin, who took it into the 1970s mainstream, is the name most often attached to it.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Earliest appearance known to Quote Investigator

Jim Bishop, The Golden Ham: A Candid Biography of Jackie Gleason (1956). Graffito form recorded in Robert Reisner, Graffiti: Two Thousand Years of Wall Writing (1971). Both as documented by Quote Investigator, “Even If You Win the Rat Race, You’re Still a Rat,” September 28, 2014.

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘Even If You Win the Rat Race, You're Still a Rat’?” Last verified 1 Nov 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/even-if-you-win-the-rat-race-youre-still-a-rat/

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