Markets and Politics: The Human Product

1981 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert E. Lane
Keyword(s):  
Gross National Product ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Abraham Maslow ◽  
The West ◽  
Harmonious Development ◽  
Surplus Value ◽  
Material Reward ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Zero Sum ◽  
Prime Source

What values should a society seek to maximize? Religious values, as in Calvin's Geneva or Khomeini's Iran? Power and Glory? The Wealth of Nations, the Gross National Product? The greatest happiness for the greatest number? Or, in Humboldt's phrase, ‘the highest and most harmonious development of [man's] powers to a complete and consistent whole?’There is much to be said for wealth. Quite recently it has been discovered that the pursuit of wealth is a game against nature not a war game, a zero-sum game, with booty as its prize. The distribution of increments of wealth can, under these circumstances, be Pareto optimal. As Marx pointed out, winning the struggle against scarcity is a condition for everything else: men must eat before they can think. Similarly, in ordering a hierarchy of needs, the contemporary humanist psychologist, Abraham Maslow, makes the same obvious point: the satisfaction of physiological needs is a condition for the satisfaction of higher needs, in the end for self-fulfilment – for Humboldt's ‘harmonious development of man's powers’. Wealth gives satisfaction; Bentham believed it was the prime source of happiness. Adam Smith argued that ‘the desire of bettering our condition…[through] an augmentation of fortune’ was the most powerful (and vulgar) of motives, but it was often a mask for a concern for the good opinions of others. So strong a motive lends itself to social control: ‘the steadiest motive in ordinary business work is the desire for pay which is the material reward for work’. Like B. F. Skinner, Marshall held that money is a general reinforcer because of its universal appeal. And it is the foundation of civilization, not only because surplus value may be devoted to cathedrals, but, following Schumpeter, because a society guided by the rationalism of the market's manner of pursuing wealth, is reflected in the high art and science of the West. In the process of maximizing wealth, therefore, a society motivates its members, satisfies them, and provides the basis for high civilization.

Culture and Well-Being

2010 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 463-471 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shigehiro Oishi ◽  
Ulrich Schimmack
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Relationships ◽  
Gross National Product ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Fundamental Question ◽  
National Product ◽  
Subjective Well Being ◽  
Good Society ◽  
Wealth Of Nations

What is a good society? Philosophers from Plato to Bentham have argued that a good society is a happy society—namely, a society in which most citizens are happy and free from fear. Since the publication of The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith in 1776, most economists have implicitly assumed that a happy society is a materially wealthy society. Thus, gross national product and related indices became the most popular indicators of the well-being of nations from the 1950s to date. Recently, however, prominent economists as well as political scientists, sociologists, and psychologists have shown that a happy society is not only a materially wealthy society but also a society in which citizens can trust one another, have a sense of freedom, and have close social relationships. The inquiry into the psychological wealth of nations, or the subjective well-being of nations, helps answer a fundamental question in philosophy and social sciences for millennia: “What is a good society?”

scholarly journals Kontribusi Para Ilmuwan Muslim Dalam Bidang Ilmu Akuntansi

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 218
Author(s):  
Warto Warto
Keyword(s):  
Economic Theory ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
The West ◽  
State Budget ◽  
Ibn Khaldun ◽  
Qualitative Descriptive ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Individual Scale ◽  
Descriptive Method

The blurring of history in the field of science often occurs. In the 18th century AD Adam Smith wrote an economic theory in the book "An Inquiry Into The Nature and Cause Of The Wealth of Nations" later known that economic theory was adopted from the work of phenomenal cleric Ibn Khaldun, written in his book 'al-Muqaddimah'. The same thing happened in Accounting which has obscured its history by the West. This study aims to explore the historical roots of the contribution of Muslim scientists in the field of Accounting. By using a qualitative descriptive method and historical approach, the results of the study show that Islamic Accounting was developed earlier by Muslims than conventional accounting. Islamic accounting emerged and developed since the time of the Prophet Muhammad around the year 610 AD. Whereas Conventional Accounting was introduced to Lucas Pacioli in 1494 AD. Basics of Sharia Accounting in general have been hinted at in the Koran surah al-Baqarah verse 282 and the sunnahs of the Prophet. The paragraph explains the function and importance of recording transactions, the basics, and their benefits, which are the essence of Accounting. Since the time of the Prophet Muhammad until the time of Khulafaur Rashidin, accounting laws have been applied either on an individual scale, syariah or company, waqf accounting, rights prohibiting the use of assets (hijr) and the state budget. In addition, in that era, the accounting profession was also known as "hafazhatul amwal" (financial supervisor).

Mercantilism

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth A. Reinert
Keyword(s):  
Adam Smith ◽  
Precious Metals ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
East India Company ◽  
Positive Development ◽  
Policy Position ◽  
Economic Nationalism ◽  
Western European ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Zero Sum

The notion of “mercantilism” or the “mercantile system” as a formal idea was identified by Adam Smith in his The Wealth of Nations. Smith had in mind a set of writers (the mercantilists) who were active in the 16th and 17th centuries, primarily but not exclusively in England. As commonly stated, mercantilist thought supported a policy position that countries should attempt to achieve trade surpluses that result in an inflow of “precious metals” or gold. In some renderings, this inflow of gold was seen as supporting royal treasuries. Mercantilism was often expressed as a system of economic nationalism. As such, it also had elements of a “zero sum” approach to international economics relations, although whether this “zero sum” thinking extended into the domestic realm is a matter of some debate. In recent decades, interpretations of what exactly mercantilism stood for have diverged significantly. This is perhaps a positive development as it provides layers of nuance to what had become a simplification of what mercantilist writers really stated, as well as differences of opinion among these writers. The origins of mercantilism are wrapped up with another school of thought—that of “bullionism,” which focused directly on transactions in precious metals. These two schools of thought had a significant temporal overlap, although mercantilism eventually prevailed. Mercantilism also became wrapped up in European colonial activities, from the British East India Company, some of whose spokesmen were mercantilist writers, to Prince Leopold’s Belgian Congo disaster. For this reason, it is important to consider the impacts of mercantilism both within the Western European context and within Western European colonial systems. While in the end the mercantilist emphasis on the balance of trade and, more broadly, economic nationalism was incorrect, modern analysis of the school of thought has revealed that the mercantilist writers were indeed engaged in real economic analysis. Key concepts uncovered by mercantilist writers included balance of payments accounting, trade in services, monetary theory, aggregate employment, exchange rate determination, and others. These insights secure mercantilism a place in the history of economic thought.

Two Intellectual Landmarks in the Year 1749

2019 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 101-123
Author(s):  
Farhad Rassekh
Keyword(s):  
Paradigm Shift ◽  
David Hume ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Considerable Extent ◽  
Monetary Theory ◽  
Economic Theories ◽  
Classical Economics ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Economic Thinking

In the year 1749 Adam Smith conceived his theory of commercial liberty and David Hume laid the foundation of his monetary theory. These two intellectual developments, despite their brevity, heralded a paradigm shift in economic thinking. Smith expanded and promulgated his theory over the course of his scholarly career, culminating in the publication of The Wealth of Nations in 1776. Hume elaborated on the constituents of his monetary framework in several essays that were published in 1752. Although Smith and Hume devised their economic theories in 1749 independently, these theories complemented each other and to a considerable extent created the structure of classical economics.

scholarly journals HOW SHOULD WE RECONCILE SELF-REGARDING AND PRO-SOCIAL MOTIVATIONS? A RENAISSANCE OF “DAS ADAM SMITH PROBLEM”

2020 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 80-102
Author(s):  
Natalie Gold
Keyword(s):  
Adam Smith ◽  
Crowding Out ◽  
Private Interests ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
Intrinsic Motivations ◽  
Social Motivations ◽  
Motivation Crowding ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Selfish Agents

Abstract“Das Adam Smith Problem” is the name given by eighteenth-century German scholars to the question of how to reconcile the role of self-interest in the Wealth of Nations with Smith’s advocacy of sympathy in Theory of Moral Sentiments. As the discipline of economics developed, it focused on the interaction of selfish agents, pursuing their private interests. However, behavioral economists have rediscovered the existence and importance of multiple motivations, and a new Das Adam Smith Problem has arisen, of how to accommodate self-regarding and pro-social motivations in a single system. This question is particularly important because of evidence of motivation crowding, where paying people can backfire, with payments achieving the opposite effects of those intended. Psychologists have proposed a mechanism for the crowding out of “intrinsic motivations” for doing a task, when payment is used to incentivize effort. However, they argue that pro-social motivations are different from these intrinsic motivations, implying that crowding out of pro-social motivations requires a different mechanism. In this essay I present an answer to the new Das Adam Smith problem, proposing a mechanism that can underpin the crowding out of both pro-social and intrinsic motivations, whereby motivations are prompted by frames and motivation crowding is underpinned by the crowding out of frames. I explore some of the implications of this mechanism for research and policy.

The Early History of Financial Economics, 1478–1776. By Geoffrey Poitras. Cheltenham and Northampton: Edward Elgar, 2000. Pp. x, 522.

2002 ◽  
Vol 62 (1) ◽  
pp. 268-269
Author(s):  
Larry Neal
Keyword(s):  
Economic History ◽  
Financial Analysis ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
Financial History ◽  
X 522 ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Simon Fraser University

Economic historians usually have to explain to their economist colleagues the difference between economic history, which focuses on facts, and history of economic thought, which focuses on ideas. Our colleagues in finance departments, typically fascinated by episodes in financial history treated by economic historians, are bound to be disappointed in the lack of attention given to the development of ideas in finance by historians of economic thought. Geoffrey Poitras, a professor of finance at Simon Fraser University, makes a valiant effort to remedy these oversights in his collection of vignettes that highlight the sophistication of financial instruments and analysts of financial markets well before the time of Adam Smith. Starting in 1478 with the publication of the Treviso Arithmetic, a typical textbook of commercial arithmetic for Italian merchants, and ending with brief snippets from the Wealth of Nations, Poitras treats the reader to a fascinating potpourri of excerpts from various manuals, brief biographies of pioneers in financial analysis, and historical discursions on foreign-exchange and stock markets.

scholarly journals Was Adam Smith an evolutionary economist?: Smith’s study of botany and Charles Darwin’s theory of morality

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tetsuo Taka
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Nutritional Value ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Value Theory ◽  
Experiential Knowledge ◽  
Moral Sentiments ◽  
Darwinian Theory ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Theory Of Moral Sentiments

AbstractThis paper aims to extend and provide a new understanding of Adam Smith’s thoughts by focusing on some revisions in the 4th edition of The Theory of Moral Sentiments (Smith 1774), “the nutritional value theory of corn” in the Wealth of Nations, and then comparing Smith’s discourses on the formation of morality with C. Darwin’s. Smith’s understanding of human nature extended and deepened with the study of botany and other sciences at Kirkcaldy after spending 2 years in France as Duke Buccleugh’s tutor. He began to understand human nature not only as a composite of self-love and benevolence, but also of instinctual and experiential knowledge. Thus, Smith’s system transitioned to an evolutionary one, and he became an unconscious forerunner of the Darwinian theory of morality formation.

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