The actually existing Adam Smith

Post Reply New Topic

"We rarely hear, it has been said, of the combinations of masters, though frequently of those of the workman. But whoever imagines, upon this account, that masters rarely combine, is as ignorant of the world as of the subject."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book I, Chapter VIII, pg.80

"Our merchants and master-manufacturers complain much of the bad effects of high wages in raising the price, and thereby lessening the sale of their goods both at home and abroad. They say nothing concerning the bad effects of high profits. They are silent with regard to the pernicious effects of their own gains. They complain only of those of other people."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book I, Chapter IX, pg.117

"Whenever the legislature attempts to regulate the differences between masters and their workman,its counsellors are always the masters. When the regulation, therefore, is in favor of the workmen, it is always just and equitable; but it is sometimes otherwise when in favor of the masters."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book I, Chapter x, Part II, pg.168

"But what all the violence of the feudal institutions could never have effected, the silent and insensible operation of foreign commerce and manufactures gradually brought about."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book III, Chapter IV, pg.448

"All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book III, Chapter IV, pg.448

"Goods can serve many other purposes besides purchasing money,but money can serve no other purpose besides purchasing goods."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book IV, Chapter I, pg.471

"The commodities of Europe were almost all new to America, and many of those of America were new to Europe. A new set of exchanges, therefore, began..and which should naturally have proved as advantageous to the new, as it certainly did to the old continent. The savage injustice of the Europeans rendered an event, which ought to have been beneficial to all, ruinous and destructive to several of those unfortunate countries. "
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book IV, Chapter I, pg.481

"To expect, indeed, that the freedom of trade should ever be entirely restored in Great Britain, is as absurd as to expect that an Oceana or Utopia should never be established in it."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book IV, Chapter II, pg.505

"The government of an exclusive company of merchants is, perhaps, the worst of all governments for any country whatever."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book IV, Chapter VII, Part Second, p. 619

"To found a great empire for the sole purpose of raising up a people of customers, may at first appear a project fit only for a nation of shopkeepers. It is however, a project altogether unfit for a nation of shopkeepers; but extremely fit for a nation whose government is influenced by shopkeepers."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book IV, Chapter VII, Part Third, pg.667

"Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to, only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book IV, Chapter VIII, pg.719

"According to the system of natural liberty, the sovereign has only three duties to attend to; three duties of great importance, indeed, but plain and intelligible to common understandings: First, the duty of protecting the society from violence and invasion of other independent societies; secondly, the duty of protecting, as far as possible, every member of the society from the injustice or oppression of every other member of it, or the duty of establishing an exact administration of justice; and, thirdly, the duty of erecting and maintaining certain public works and certain public institutions, which it can never be for the interest of any individual, or small number of individuals, to erect and maintain; because the profit would never repay the expense to any individual or small number of individuals, though it may frequently do much more than repay it to a great society."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book IV, Chapter IX, pg. 749

"Wherever there is great property, there is great inequality."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter I, Part II, pg.770

"Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defence of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter I, Part II, 775

"The tolls for the maintenance of a high road, cannot with any safety be made the property of private persons."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter I, Part III, Article I, pg.786

"Though the principles of the banking trade may appear somewhat abstruse, the practice is capable of being reduced to strict rules. To depart upon any occasion from these rules, in consequence of some flattering speculation of extraordinary gain, is almost always extremely dangerous, and frequently fatal to the banking company which attempts it."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter I, Part III, pg.820

"The education of the common people requires, perhaps, in a civilized and commercial society, the attention of the public more then that of people of some rank and fortune."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter I, Part III, pg.845

"For a very small expence the public can facilitate, can encourage, and can even impose upon almost the whole body of the people, the necessity of acquiring those most essential parts of education."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter I, Part III, Article II, p.847

"The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities, that is, in proportion to the revenue which they respectively enjoy under the protection of the state."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter II, Part II, pg.892

"It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expence, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter II, Part II, Article I, pg.911

"Every tax, however, is to the person who pays it a badge, not of slavery but of liberty. It denotes that he is a subject to government, indeed, but that, as he has some property, he cannot himself be the property of a master."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter II, Part II, pg.927

"But bounty and hospitality very seldom lead to extravagance; though vanity almost always does."
- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book V, Chapter III, Part V, pg.987

The bolded piece is why I think that healthcare and education need to be in the public services rather than privatized.

This is a great thread to refer back to anytime rightwingers start hagiographically referencing Adam Smith.

Adam Smith was brilliant and much of what he wrote is as true today as when he wrote it.

ruveyn

You need to read the second half of the bolded piece as well as the first. There are plenty of private schools and self employed doctors, so education and health care clearly don't fit the "never repay the expense to any individual or small number of individuals" criteria.

Smith is talking abou natural monopolies like local roads or sewer systems.

Indeed it would - but the leftwingers will probably prefer to continue distorting peoples' views instead.

Exactly. Private firms will never have enough spare capital to provide all the infrastructure a major industrial nation needs. What they can do, however, is spend sufficient amounts of money on "clean technology" so as not to overburden the air we breath the the water we drink with avoidable pollution. That IS something a private firm can do.

The interesting thing to note is when we do create appropriate infrastructure a public expense (i.e. at tax payer expense) we ALL benefit even though none of us individually could have brought about that benefit. Adam Smith was right. Markets do not provide ALL that a modern industrial society needs.

ruveyn