Adam Smith (Biographies, N.d.)
Smith's Biography
The Wealth of Nations
Book I: Of the Causes of Improvement in the productive Powers of Labor
Book II: Of the Nature, Accumulation, and Employment of Stock
Book III -- IV
Adam Smith was one of the most influential thinkers of the modern era. Smith's work laid the foundation for our modern economic system of capitalism -- he is sometimes referred to as the "father of capitalism." This analysis will cover his life and a brief biographical section, followed by his theoretical contribution to capitalism. Smith was far ahead of his time relative to political economy and argued that markets were an ideal form of resources allocation. However, in Smith's day, markets actually looked like small markets composed of buyers and sellers. Today, the concept of markets has become far more abstract and markets seldom resemble the form that Smith himself was familiar with. Although Smith is best known for his work, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776), he also wrote many works on moral philosophy. Furthermore, although one of the most famous phrases associated with Smith is the "invisible hand," the term actually only appears twice in his works and the term is used to describe the social benefits that follow from individuals pursuing their own self-interest and not the interest of others.
"As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of domestic industry, and so to direct that industry that its produce may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was no part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it (Smith, N.d.)."
Smith's Biography
Adam Smith was born in Kirkcaldy, Scotland, where his widowed mother raised him after his father died when he was just a small baby. Much of his childhood remains unknown however it is commonly noted that Smith was close to his mother and it was likely her that pushed him towards his academic career. At age fourteen, as was the usual practice, he entered the University of Glasgow on scholarship; he later attended Balliol College at Oxford, graduating with an extensive knowledge of European literature and an enduring contempt for English schools (The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics, N.d.). After Smith returned home, and after delivering a series of well-received lectures was made first chair of logic (1751), then chair of moral philosophy (1752), at Glasgow University.
Smith's career took a fortunate turn. He left the school in 1764 to tutor the young duke of Buccleuch which allowed him to be exposed to many interesting contemporary minds. For more than two years Smith and his student traveled throughout France and into Switzerland, an experience that brought Smith into contact with his contemporaries Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, FranAois Quesnay, and Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot (The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics, N.d.). Furthermore, this position also gave him a degree of financial freedom. With the life pension he had earned in the service of the duke, Smith retired to his birthplace of Kirkcaldy to write The Wealth of Nations which was published as a five-book series and focused on the underlying factors that contributed to a nation's prosperity. Adam Smith actually published only two works -- the first was The Theory of Moral Sentiment when he was thirty-six years old and then The Wealth of Nations when he was fifty-three (Kaufman, 2001).
It has been argued that one of Smith's most fundamental beliefs is that individuals benefited through trade; interestingly however, this was not confined to the realm of economics. Trading, it turns out, was not only a central human trait in The Wealth of Nations but also in The Theory of Moral Sentiments. Phillipson writes that for Smith, "morality is a matter of trading sentiments in the hope of being able to conclude a rewarding emotional deal" (Brown,...
Adam Smith He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases,
His lectures were a success as many eminent people of Edinburgh attended them and earned him a decent income. During the course of his lectures on English literature, Smith perhaps realized that his real vocation was economics. Hence, addition to English literature, he started to deliver lectures in economics in 1750-51 in which he advocated the doctrines of commercial liberty, based largely on the ideas of Hutcheson. It was also
Adam Smith's Economic Philosophy: Just as Smith's moral point-of-view was ahead of his time with respect to ideas that others would popularize later, Smith presented matter-of-fact observations on the nature of work and the relationship between working people and society at large. More than one hundred years before Henry Ford revolutionized modern industry with his production line, Smith had explained the mechanism that accounted for its success. Using the example of manufacturing
Adam Smith's Inquiry Address to the First Women's Rights Convention" was a speech given by Elizabeth Cady Stanton in order to raise voice against male chauvinism and religious bigotry and how it had been used to suppress women throughout history. Women Rights in Eighteenth Century America "Address to the First Women's Rights Convention" was a speech given by Elizabeth Cady Stanton in order to raise voice against male chauvinism and religious bigotry and
To Smith, the natural world from which human beings emerged was not only insignificant and worthless, it was positively odious. He saw nothing to save, foster, or conserve about it. He thought people who lived in subsistence cultures were "so miserably poor they are frequently reduced to the necessity sometimes of directly destroying, and sometimes of abandoning their infants, their old people, and those afflicted with lingering diseases, to perish
Give me that which I want, and you shall have this which you want, is the meaning of every such offer" (Smith, 1776, p. 118-119). The unintentional consequence is thee same as it was before: an increasingly respectable and thriving nation, one so much so that it is as if shaped by what Smith deems the "invisible hand," from which Smith thus concludes that "it is the necessary, certain propensity
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