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2. DISCUSSION.
- Author
-
Baldwin, Robert E. and Fellner, William J.
- Subjects
CLASSICAL school of economics ,COMMODITY exchanges ,LABOR theory of value ,ECONOMISTS - Abstract
This article presents a discussion on the research paper "What Was the Labor Theory of Value?" by Donald F. Gordon, a professor at the University of Washington, published in the May 1959 issue of the journal "American Economic Review." Recent investigators into the origins and development of the labor theory of value find themselves arriving at rather unique conclusions. Usually contemporary historians of economic doctrine are provided with abundant opportunities to disagree with one another over the interpretation of what any one economist or group of economists really was saying about a given subject. In the case of the labor theory of value, however, recent commentators are surprisingly unanimous. They agree that neither economist Adam Smith nor David Ricardo nor even Karl Marx held a labor theory of value. According to Gordon most post-Ricardian economists did not believe Ricardo claimed that commodities exchange at ratios which are dependent upon the quantities of labor involved in their production, which itself makes the association of Ricardo's name with the labor theory of value, a bit apocryphal.
- Published
- 1959
3. SOME INTERNATIONAL ASPECTS OF THE PROBLEM OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT.
- Author
-
Nurkse, Ragnar
- Subjects
ECONOMIC conditions in developing countries ,ECONOMIC development ,PRODUCTION (Economic theory) ,MARKETS ,ECONOMICS ,ECONOMIC activity - Abstract
This paper will discuss some international aspects of the problem of economic development. It will take up only a few points and cannot even attempt to give anything like a balanced picture. The inducement to invest is limited by the size of the market. That is essentially what economy Allyn Young brought out in his reinterpretation of economist Adam Smith's famous thesis. What determines the size of the market? Not simply money demand, nor mere numbers of people, nor physical area. Transport facilities, which Adam Smith singled out for special emphasis, are important, reductions in transport costs do enlarge the market in the economic as well as the geographical sense. But reductions in any cost of production tend to have that effect. So the size of the market is determined by the general level of productivity. Capacity to buy means capacity to produce. In its turn, the level of productivity depends not entirely by any means, but largely on the use of capital in production. But the use of capital is inhibited, to start with, by the small size of the market.
- Published
- 1952
4. A LETTER FROM ADAM SMITH.
- Author
-
Dickinson, Z. Clark
- Subjects
ENGLISH letters ,ECONOMISTS ,BIOGRAPHICAL sources ,SOCIOECONOMICS ,SOCIAL sciences ,LITERATURE - Abstract
The article analyzes a letter from economist Adam Smith to William Fitzmaurice, Earl of Shelburne. The author mentions that in 1782, Smith expressed opposition to Shelburne's assumption of the premier cabinet post. He comments that in such reactions, Smith seems somewhat naive and unappreciative of the extent to which Shelburne was attempting to give practical effect to principles taught by Smith. But, in conclusion he says that the letter tends to confirm other evidences that Smith and Shelburne, whose views and influences were so alike on so many matters, had personal contacts which were warm though not numerous.
- Published
- 1958
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
5. THE DEVELOPMENT OF ADAM SMITH'S IDEAS ON THE DIVISION OF LABOUR.
- Author
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Meek, Ronald L. and Skinner, Andrew S.
- Subjects
DIVISION of labor ,LECTURES & lecturing - Abstract
Let us begin with a brief review of the main documents which Scott had before him when he wrote his monumental Adam Smith as Student and Professor,[1] and the main assumptions which he made concerning their dates. First, there were "four documents, amounting to fifteen folio pages" which Scott discovered "amongst letters kept by Adam Smith.''[2] One of these documents, as Scott himself indicated, is very probably not by Smith, but a copy of a paper on prices which he had received from Lord Hailes.[3] A second, on moral philosophy, has recently been edited by Professor Raphael, who has quite properly questioned Scott's judgment as to date of composition, while indicating that it was probably written before the first edition of the Theory of Moral Sentiments in 1759.[4] The two remaining documents--the really relevant ones so far as the present article is concerned--deal more or less exclusively with the division of labour, and were thought by [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1973
- Full Text
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6. ECONOMICA.
- Subjects
DIVISION of labor ,DUOPOLIES ,COMPETITION ,FARM size ,PRODUCTION (Economic theory) ,AGRICULTURE - Abstract
This section presents abstracts of articles on economics and other related topics published in the May 1965 issue of the journal Economica. The article Adam Smith on the Division of Labour: Two Views or One?, by Nathan Rosenberg attempts to demonstrate that Smith's handling of the consequences of a growing division of labor was in fact substantially free of the contradictions which have often been attributed to it. But more important, it attempts to show that there is embedded in Smiths' writing a fairly sophisticated and hitherto unnoticed analysis of the determinants of inventive activity. Inventive activity is itself envisaged by Smith as a specialised activity within the framework of a larger social division of labor. Moreover, the paper titled A Dissenting View of Duopoly and Spatial Competition, by Nicos E. Devletoglou develops an operational mechanism capable of questioning the significance of the celebrated Hotelling thesis on spatial competition under conditions of duopoly. Furthermore, the article Size of Farm and Productivity: A Problem of Indian Peasant Agriculture, by Dipak Mazumdar presents a cross-section analysis of data in the recent farm management surveys in India. The data shows that as the size of the farm decreases the amount of input per acre increases, as does the output per acre. An examination of the data shows that this result is mainly due to the application of more labour per unit of land as the size of the farm becomes smaller. The analysis yields the conclusion that the marginal product of labour in Indian agriculture is positive but less than the going wage-rate. The policy implications of the observation that smaller farms are in some sense more efficient are also interesting.
- Published
- 1965
7. ECONOMICA: FEBRUARY 1964.
- Author
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Paish, F.W., Zauberman, Alfred, Archibald, G.C., West, E.G., Sengupta, Jati K., Grant, J.A.G., Hewitt, John, and Kemp, Murray C.
- Subjects
ECONOMICS ,INTERNATIONAL trade ,DIVISION of labor - Abstract
Presents a series of abstracts on various topics of economics published in the February 1964 issue of the periodical 'Economica.' Opinion of economist Roy Harrod on the growth of British economy; Problems faced by planners in planned economies in making choices regarding foreign trade; Analysis of views of economist Adam Smith on the division of labor; Impact of the increase in a single money price on aggregate expenditure.
- Published
- 1964
8. THE PERFECTLY COMPETITIVE PRODUCTION OF COLLECTIVE GOODS.
- Author
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Thompson, Earl A.
- Subjects
FREE enterprise ,ECONOMICS ,PERFECT competition ,PRIVATE sector ,MARKETS - Abstract
Since the days of economist Adam Smith, economic theorists have treated collective goods, goods whose benefits can be enjoyed concurrently by everyone, as if their production were the unavoidable responsibility of the public sector. This treatment of collective goods has permitted increasingly complete theoretical demonstrations of the efficiency of perfect competition in the private sector. It is of both theoretical and practical interest to examine the efficiency of a competitive, free enterprise economy which produces and sells both private goods and collective goods. This paper concentrates on perfect markets. In particular, it assumes throughout the formal analysis that there is perfect knowledge of all market-relevant information and perfect exclusion. Perfect exclusion exists when any possessor of a collective good can demand a fee from each individual on the basis of a freely enforceable threat to exclude that individual from receiving the benefit of, or using, the collective good.
- Published
- 1968
- Full Text
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9. The Citizens Ephemerides of the Physiocrats.
- Author
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Wasserman, Max J. and Tate, Juanita D.
- Subjects
PHYSIOCRATS ,PUBLICATIONS ,ECONOMICS ,PERIODICALS ,ECONOMICS literature ,ECONOMISTS - Abstract
The article focuses on the use of various publications by physiocrats in the eighteenth century to spread their beliefs and doctrines related to economics. In the eighteenth century, the physiocrats faced the problem of finding an appropriate media of expression. The books which the physiocrats wrote had a limited number of readers. Desiring wider public attention, the physiocrats found acceptance among the readers of an already well established periodical, that is, "Le Journal économique." As economist François Quesnay's group of devoted disciples grew in number and strength, the Journal became alarmed by the program of Quesnay's economic school. In 1763, "La Gazette du commerce," a biweekly newspaper, was launched. The physiocrats took advantage of this opportunity to promote their beliefs alongside opposing views and succeeded in making an impression. The year 1776 marked the physiocrats' official exit as a school of economic thought. That year also marked the beginning of the classical school of economic thought with the publication of Adam Smith's book "An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations."
- Published
- 1951
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
10. BASES FOR THE STUDY OF CONSUMER DEMAND.
- Author
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Tosdal, Harry R.
- Subjects
CONSUMER behavior research ,DECISION making in marketing ,CONSUMPTION (Economics) ,ECONOMIC demand ,PRODUCTION (Economic theory) ,MARKETING research ,MATHEMATICAL models of decision making ,DISTRIBUTORS (Commerce) ,INCOME - Abstract
The article reports on the study of consumer demand in the field of marketing. The author focuses on aspects of consumer behavior that affect many aspects of the production, distribution, and other aspects of industrial development. It is suggested that businessmen need information about demand to make decision relating to product quality and production rate. Statistical, economical, and psychological approaches to the study of consumption are discussed in detail. Economist Adam Smith's theory of consumption is also examined.
- Published
- 1939
- Full Text
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11. IGNATIUS DONNELLY: Apostle of Protest.
- Author
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Holbrook, Stewart H.
- Subjects
POLITICIANS ,PUBLISHING ,UNITED States history -- 1865-1898 ,PERIODICALS ,ATLANTIS (Legendary place) - Abstract
Profiles Ignatius Donnelly, the veteran frontiersman, Utopian promoter and back-country publicist who wrote the militant Populist platform of 1892 in the United States. One of the major forces of his time; Family background; Establishment of the "Emigrant Aid Journal"; Genius of Nininger, Minnesota; Dissertations about the philosophy of Adam Smith and damnation of all bankers and money lenders to hell; Most scholarly man ever to sit in Congress; Publication of the book "Atlantis, the Antideluvian World".
- Published
- 1947
12. Notes.
- Subjects
PUBLISHING ,BOOKS ,AUTHORS - Abstract
The article presents information on several literary publications. D.B. Updike, Boston, announces an elegant quarto edition of Ascanio Condivi's "The Life of Michaelangelo," translated and embellished by Herbert P. Horne. Hector Macpherson, the author of a life of Adam Smith, has prepared a condensed edition of the "Wealth of Nations." "The American Natural History," by William T. Hornaday, a large volume of 440 pages and many illustrations, is primarily for use in schools. Ralph Hoffman, a successful teacher of the art of identifying birds without the use of a gun, has just published a book for field students, entitled "A Guide to the Birds of New England and Eastern New York."
- Published
- 1904
13. Notes.
- Subjects
PUBLISHING ,DOCUMENTATION ,CATALOGS - Abstract
The article presents an overview of several literary publications. By the preparation of 'A Catalogue of the Library of Adam Smith,' Mr. James Bonar, the editor, and Messrs Macmillan, the publishers, have won the gratitude of every economic bibliophile. Smith's collection seems to have numbered some three thousand volumes--a library which Dugald Stewart could not help speaking of as "small," although he was kind enough to add that it was "excellent" and "formed with great judgment." The last number of the Proceedings of the Psychical Research Society contains, in its report of the Committee on the "Census of Halucination," the solidest and heaviest piece of work which it has yet published, and if dry- ness and dulness can make a thing scientific, then these 400 pages are as scientific as the most fastidious intellect can desire.
- Published
- 1894
14. Editorials.
- Subjects
LEGISLATIVE bills ,PAINTING ,ECONOMISTS - Abstract
This article presents information about several socio-political developments in the U.S. as of February 7, 1889. The truth of economist Adam Smith's observation, that one had only to support every proposal for strengthening the monopolists in order to acquire great popularity and influence and the reputation of understanding trade, has recently received a striking illustration. The Mills bill as it was presented to the House of Representatives contained a clause putting upon the free list "Paintings, in oil and water colors, and statuary not otherwise provided for," the latter term to include the "professional productions of a statuary or of a sculptor only."
- Published
- 1889
15. A Pricing System That Works Only One way--Up.
- Subjects
PRICING ,GOVERNMENT price policy ,PRICE regulation ,BUSINESSMEN ,MANAGEMENT of economic development ,ECONOMICS - Abstract
The article discusses the effects of pricing system in the economy, considering the strategies of businessmen and the government. It states that base on the principle of economist Adam Smith, an economy will be held in sustained balance through free adjusting prices. It says that not even upward movement of wages and prices in various industries can impede the growth of the economy. Meanwhile, individual businesses' price-setting is directed towards gaining of profit or competition elimination.
- Published
- 1957
16. Back to Grandfather.
- Author
-
Chase, Stuart
- Subjects
INTERNATIONAL economic relations ,MONOPOLIES ,ECONOMISTS ,POLITICAL participation ,STATUS (Law) - Abstract
In this article, the author discusses assumptions related to international economic affairs in terms of political and legal liberalism. He cites the example of economist Friedrich August von Hayek. Professor Hayek was an Austrian economist who went to England with other German and Austrian scholar exiles in the early 1930's. They were welcomed by the London School of Economics, and began an evangelical revival of the doctrine of free competition as formulated a century and a half ago by Scottish economist Adam Smith. The basic assumption, reportedly, is that economic affairs are best taken care of if individuals are left free to pursue their own personal gain. Neither the state nor private monopolies should interfere.
- Published
- 1945
17. A PLEA FOR THE USE OF THE WORDS INDIVIDUALISM AND INDIVIDUALITY.
- Author
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Branford, Sybella
- Subjects
INDIVIDUALISM ,INDIVIDUALITY ,SOCIAL theory ,PERSONALITY ,SELF-interest ,POLITICAL science - Abstract
The article discusses importance of the recovery of the proper use of the word individuality and individualism for the sane study of the political and social theories, because no other substitute for this word can be found. The word is used in the sense if representing the unique aspect or form of personality, and this appears to be its rightful meaning. It is used also as expressing the nature or conduct of those who in society act singularly, even anti-socially. It is used more frequently as if individualism, as a state of being and selfishness are synonymous terms. Individualism is spoken of as the term to express the doctrine first formulated by economist Adam Smith. Individualism is this view as is the laissez-faire one which is with it. The view on social individualism has never been enunciated, even with the incomplete dearness of the functional view, but it obviously relies on a co-operative alliance of the complemental differences of individuality in citizens and in a non-competitive individual initiative rather than on state initiative and control, or on a competitive basis, as in functionalism.
- Published
- 1922
- Full Text
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18. LETTER FROM ADAM SMITH. LL. D. To WILLIAM STRAHAN, ESQ.
- Author
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Smith, Adam
- Subjects
LETTERS ,DISEASES ,SICK people - Abstract
A letter from Adam Smith to William Strahan which describes the behaviour of David Hume during his last illness is presented. Smith claims that Hume decided to travel to London, England in late April 1776 to meet with the former and John Home. Smith also admits that Hume is already suffering from his disease during the trip. He also observes that Hume is in much better health when he arrived in the city, but his symptoms later returned.
- Published
- 1810
19. Adam Smith and Contemporary Social Exchange Theory.
- Author
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Nord, Walter
- Subjects
SOCIAL exchange ,ECONOMISTS ,SOCIAL systems ,SCHOLARS ,SOCIAL psychology - Abstract
The article comments on social exchange theory. Economist Adam Smith's most direct role in the development of modern exchange theory was, in all probability, through the influence of his work on economists. This article attempts to establish the historical precedence of Smith's exchange theory and to explore its value in theoretical development. This article will also compare modern theory with an in-depth treatment of Smith's ideas and speculate about the current value of his work and reasons why it has been relatively neglected. Smith's work is quoted extensively to permit the reader to judge the validity of the author's interpretations. Like many social-psychological models, exchange theory treats the processes through which social systems socialize their participants, maintain participant involvement in the system to permit stable patterns of social interaction, and carry on transactions with their environment. Focusing on these three processes facilitates a comparison of Smith's work with that of modern scholars. Both Smith and contemporary theorists emphasize the importance of social approval in the socialization process. Modern exchange theorists assume that people value and work for social approval and conversely dislike and attempt to avoid social disapproval.
- Published
- 1973
- Full Text
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20. ADAM SMITH'S CONCEPT OF ALIENATION.
- Author
-
LAMB, ROBERT
- Subjects
LABOR ,ALIENATION (Philosophy) ,POLITICAL economic analysis ,ETHICS ,UNDEREMPLOYMENT - Published
- 1973
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
21. WHAT WAS THE LABOR THEORY OF VALUE?
- Author
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Gordon, Donald F.
- Subjects
LABOR theory of value ,ECONOMISTS ,PRICES ,WAGES ,INDUSTRIAL costs - Abstract
This article focuses on the labor theory of value. By the modern meaning of the phrase "theory of value," the labor theory of value is presumably the proposition that commodities exchange at ratios that are reciprocals of the quantities of labor involved in their production, including, of course, that involved in the creation of capital. Economist Adam Smith presents provided a classical account of how, in a competitive market, the prices of commodities, through shifts in the allocation of factors, approach equality with their money costs of production, where the latter are estimated by the quantities of the three traditional factors remunerated at their natural or usual rates. However, another economist David Ricardo, did not subscribe to this proposition. Like Smith, he accepted the theorem on the long-run equality of price and cost. For all nonagricultural commodities, in which land is presumed not to enter, long-run average and marginal costs are presumed to be constant, but among these the proportions of capital to labor vary considerably. Thus fluctuations in the rates of wages and profits will cause fluctuations in the relative prices of these commodities, unconnected with any changes in their relative labor contents.
- Published
- 1959
22. INSTITUTIONAL FACTORS IN ECONOMIC THINKING.
- Author
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Stocking, George W.
- Subjects
ECONOMICS ,INDIVIDUALISM ,CAPITALISM - Abstract
This article considers the institutional factors in economic thinking. To Thorstein Veblen, what economists believed and had to say about the operation of economic forces in a price system was essentially a logical formulation of the preconceptions and observations of those whose daily lives were subjected to the impact of the system. The problems economists think about and the way they think about them are determined by the institutional matrix in which they find themselves. Around this idea, economist Wesley Clair Mitchell built his course in the development of economic thought from Adam Smith to John R. Commons. Smith formulated principles governing the determination of prices, the economic allocation of resources, the distribution of income, the geographic division of labor, and economic progress, and in doing so he laid the basis for late-nineteenth-century neoclassicism. Smith, in defending economic individualism as a means of promoting the national welfare, conceived of the national income as the aggregate of individual incomes .But economic individualism, the philosophical product of individualistic capitalism, had no sooner conquered men's minds than the great transformation was ushering in the next sequence in the inexorable flow of institutions and ideas.
- Published
- 1959
23. THE CONSTRUCTION OF A NEW THEORY OF PROFIT.
- Author
-
Marchal, Jean
- Subjects
CORPORATE profits ,PROFIT ,CAPITAL ,CORPORATE finance ,ENTREPRENEURSHIP ,FACTORS of production ,LABOR supply - Abstract
Most modern authors define profit as the income of the firm as such or as the price paid for performing the function of enterprise. This has not always been the case, however, Adam Smith, the founder of the classical school, so little a classicist himself shows profit as the income of the capitalist entrepreneur, that is, as the income of the individual owner of a capital sum who uses this capital to hire workers, buy machines and manufacture products which he sells on a market. But after Smith have come a whole series of authors, who have in one way or another, with all the resources of excessively atomistic analysis, dismembered Smith's basic idea. In profit, as Smith defined it, they treat as separate elements the interest which remunerates the capital provided by the entrepreneur himself and the wage which pays for his labor of direction and coordination of the factors of production. In the income of the entrepreneur, designated as gross profit, they isolate, after eliminating the interest on the entrepreneur's own capital and a wage for his labor of direction, a net profit which seems to them to be pure profit and which they then proceed to try to explain.
- Published
- 1951
24. SCARCE RAW MATERIALS: AN ANALYSIS AND A PROPOSAL.
- Author
-
Watkins, Myron W.
- Subjects
RAW materials ,ECONOMICS ,NATURAL resources ,CONSERVATION of natural resources ,SUPPLY & demand ,UNITED States economic policy ,LABOR ,CAPITAL - Abstract
In the development of political economy, alike as an academic discipline and as an art of government, there has been evinced from time to time a disposition to treat the range of problems concerned with what may be broadly termed raw material supply as distinctive. Indeed, from the middle of the eighteenth up to the middle of the nineteenth century, it would hardly be an exaggeration to say that problems of raw material supply were generally regarded by economists as not only peculiar but crucial. Thus, physiocrats accounted raw-materials producing industries the unique source of the social net product. While economist Adam Smith disputed the contention that agriculture and mining were the sole source of the Wealth of Nations, even he was willing to allow that "the labor of is certainly more productive than that of merchants, artificers, and manufacturers." And he added that "of all ways in which capital can be employed, it is by far the most advantageous to the society." After the middle of the nineteenth century, however, economics no less than economic statesmanship became increasingly concerned with the role of capital in the productive process and with the relations of capital and labor in industrial organization.
- Published
- 1944
25. AN INCIDENT IN THE LIFE OF ADAM SMITH, COMMISSIONER OF HIS MAJESTY'S CUSTOMS.
- Author
-
Vanderblue, Homer B.
- Subjects
PROFESSIONAL employees ,ECONOMISTS ,PENSIONS ,EMPLOYEES - Abstract
This articles describes the professional life of economist Adam Smith as the Commissioner of His Majesty's Customs in Great Britain. Adam Smith entered upon his duties as Commissioner of His Majesty's Customs at Edinburgh early in 1778. He was then close to fifty-five years of age, and at the height of his powers and reputation. With an assured income of £900 a year-two-thirds from his government appointments, the other third his pension from the House of Buccleugh-he was a rich man in the Edinburgh of his day and fully in position to enjoy what he loved most: "his mother, his friends, his books." Yet his acceptance of the appointment greatly disturbed his friends who were fearful that the duties of the office would prove "sufficient to waste his spirit and dissipate his attention." During the first years of his residence in this city his studies seemed to be entirely suspended and his passion for letters served only to amuse his leisure and animate his conversation.
- Published
- 1937
26. PRICE ECONOMICS VERSUS WELFARE ECONOMICS.
- Author
-
Fetter, Frank A.
- Subjects
ECONOMICS ,ECONOMISTS ,EXTERNALITIES ,LABOR - Abstract
This article attempts to trace the growth of the commercial conception of the economics from the time of Adam Smith to its apogee in J. S. Mill and to describe the contemporary opposition to it. Smith more easily could distinguish between monetary prices and national wealth because of his use of the word "price" in a broader sense than that which became prevalent among his followers and from the first he contrasted "the price of commodities" in labor and in money. David Ricardo's main work appeared in 1817 and it is no mere chance that the beginning of the great increase of popular interest in economics have been dated the following year. It was chiefly Ricardo who gave to the liberal economic doctrine, handed down from Adam Smith, both its appearance of theoretical completeness and its pronounced commercial character. Ricardian economics was in full vigor from 1818 until 1860. The ethical protest against price economics was led by Thomas Carlyle, who voiced his opinions with characteristic vigor in three successive groups of essays. Carlyle's fulminations on economic evils gave offense in some quarters but, uttered, as they were, when he was at the very height of his literary reputation, had doubtless a notable effect and many have had no small part in hastening various measures of parliamentary reform.
- Published
- 1920
27. ARISTOTLE AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF VALUE THEORY.
- Author
-
Gordon, Barry J.
- Subjects
LABOR costs ,INDUSTRIAL costs ,LABOR theory of value ,LABOR supply - Abstract
The article discusses the development of the labor or cost-of-production tradition of Aristotle, which indicates that labor cost was connected with the process of value determination. It informs that an eighteenth century thinker who was directly familiar with the works of Aristotle, and who was at least indirectly influenced by scholastic writers, might take a labor-oriented approach. Such an orientation can be shown to persist in early value theory along with the utility element, as a secondary, but nevertheless influential, factor. Further, there are a number of passages in Aristotle's writings, which can be interpreted as indicating that he also thought that labor cost was connected with the process of value determination. It has adequately demonstrated how the Austrian value theorists of the nineteenth century were anticipated in part, by writers in a tradition, which stemmed from Aristotle. However, there is also a labor or cost-of-production tradition which may be less obvious, but which links Adam Smith, the scholastics and Aristotle.
- Published
- 1964
- Full Text
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28. THE INTERNATIONAL MATERIAL CONFERENCE IN RETROSPECT.
- Author
-
Liebhafsky, H.H.
- Subjects
INTERNATIONAL economic relations ,RAW materials ,ECONOMIC summit conferences ,COMMERCIAL policy ,GOVERNMENT policy - Abstract
The article discusses the reasons for the establishment and the operations of the International Material Conference during the Korean emergency and discusses the appropriateness of economist Adam Smith's dictum, that restrictions on international trade are justified when some particular industry is necessary for the defense of the country, as guide to economic policy. When the Korean emergency began, the domestic economy was approaching full employment. It was likely that additional large demands for raw materials arising primarily from the emergency might have to be met by creating or discovering additional productive units rather than from existing facilities. Temporarily, certain "nonessential" or "less essential" demands might have to be administratively curtailed unless prices were to be allowed to serve as a rationing device. In the 1950s the United States had adopted and was implementing a political policy of collective defense under the Mutual Defense Assistance Program and had adopted and was implementing a long-term policy of freer international trade, which also applied to raw materials.
- Published
- 1957
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
29. THE BALANCED BUDGET.
- Author
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Burkhead, Jesse
- Subjects
BUDGET deficits ,ECONOMISTS ,ACCOUNTS payable ,ORGANIZATION ,PUBLIC debts - Abstract
This article examines economists' intellectual heritage in the matter of budget balancing. It is commonly held that the classicists assumed that the economic role of the state must necessarily be limited and they then adduced certain rationalizations regarding the nature of governmental fiscal operations to support this assumption. It seems more likely that such economists as Adam Smith looked first at the objective requirements of the economic order and then proceeded to theorize about the proper role of the state therein. Adam Smith's views on balanced budgets were conditioned vary largely by his views on national debt. And his views on the latter are a clear and direct product of his antimercantilism. It is difficult to dissociate Smith, the antimereantile-polemicist, from Smith the economist. His often quoted passages defining, in restrictive terms, the proper and legitimate functions of the state should probably be viewed not so much as an evidence of his pro-laissez-faire position as an evidence of his antimercantilism. Smith was an antimercantilist because he saw that the state apparatus as it then existed was an inefficient organization from the standpoint of wealth and income creation.
- Published
- 1954
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
30. THE RETARDED ACCEPTANCE OF THE MARGINAL UTILITY THEORY.
- Author
-
Kauder, Emil
- Subjects
MARGINAL utility ,UTILITY theory ,ECONOMISTS ,CONSUMER goods - Abstract
The article presents information on the development and acceptance of the marginal utility theory. Much earlier than is generally assumed the theorists of subjective value had discovered the principles of marginal utility. At the time of economist Adam Smith, Italian and French economists already considered it self-evident that the interplay of utility and scarcity explains the value of consumer goods, money and the level of wages. The French, Italian and Swiss writers had solved all problems of marginal utility except one, no one saw the connection between marginal utility and the individual value of equal units. Economist William F. Lloyd discovered the correct relation in 1834. Fourteen years later economist John Stuart Mill, in his Principles expounded a somewhat weak mixture of objective and subjective elements in his theory of value. Mill, like other economists either by-passed the utility approach or paid scant attention to it. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries it was not ignorance which accounted for the dividing line between the two opposing points of view, but rather the antagonism between the Aristotelian-Thomistic and the Protestant social schools of thought.
- Published
- 1953
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
31. THE TERM "FAVORABLE BALANCE OF TRADE"
- Author
-
Fetter, Frank Whitson
- Subjects
BALANCE of trade ,MERCANTILE system ,SURPLUS (Economics) ,FOREIGN exchange rates ,ECONOMISTS - Abstract
The article examines the usage of the term, favorable balance of trade, by American economists in light of the origin and development of the expressions favorable and unfavorable balance of trade. It asserts that the impression of mercantilists about the term, such that it implies the advantage of excess commodity exports over commodity exports, is merely conventional and is not a true index of the economic well-being of a country. Several works dealing with the commercial or mercantile system and the balance of trade were analyzed like "The Wealth of Nations," by economist Adam Smith, and the Bullion Report, which identified the balance of trade with the movement of exchange rates.
- Published
- 1935
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
32. ECONOMICS AND THE IDEA OF JUS NATURALE.
- Author
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Taylor, O. H.
- Subjects
NATURAL law ,SOCIAL theory ,ECONOMIC systems ,NATURE ,EMOTIONS ,ETHICS ,PUBLIC welfare - Abstract
This article discusses the role of the natural laws in the economic philosophies of French economist Francois Quesnay and his disciples and of economist Adam Smith. According to the author, the economic and social philosophies of the Physiocrats and Smith, though very different in character, thus came to very similar results. Under a natural law, a natural economic process would ensure the working out of appropriate adjustments in the economic system and the maximization of national wealth. The Physiocrats said that the natural legal system was the one indicated by the Nature, through certain simple and obvious facts of social life, to the reason of the reformer, as the system intended and calculated to promote the general welfare. Whereas Smith said it was the system which harmonizes with the moral sentiments that the Nature engenders in men's minds through the workings of sympathy. The natural economic process was not an uncontrolled process but the process intended by the Nature, and capable of complete realization as the actual economic process only if the state should do its part by establishing the laws and policies prescribed by the Nature.
- Published
- 1930
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
33. THE NEED FOR A SOCIOLOGY OF LABOUR.
- Author
-
Allen, V. L.
- Subjects
LABOR costs ,SOCIAL scientists ,ECONOMISTS ,ECONOMICS ,PSYCHIATRISTS - Abstract
A representative collection of people who profess to study labor problems today would consist of members of almost every social science faculty. There would be economists, historians, philosophers, anthropologists, sociologists, lawyers, political theorists, psychiatrists, psychologists and others. Each would be looking at labor behavior from his specialist point of view; convinced, justifiably, that his view was important, but rarely if ever taking account of the views of others. This state of affairs has evolved because the factors which aroused the interest of academics in labor problems have been many and varied. Early political economists were interested in the wages of labor and in the quantity of labour used in production. Sociologist Adam Smith examined wages as a price but his approach had width as well as depth as befitted a moral philosopher. Political economists who followed paid less attention to wages and more to the quantity of labour in production.
- Published
- 1959
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
34. A NOTE ON LABOUR, WAGES, AND RENT IN SMITH'S THEORY OF VALUE.
- Author
-
Rosenbluth, G.
- Subjects
VALUE (Economics) ,LABOR ,WAGES ,RENT - Abstract
Comments on Adam Smith's theory of value specifically labor, wages and rent. Criticisms on Smith's theory; Role of labor in Smith's theory; Information on Smith's cost-of-production theory.
- Published
- 1969
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
35. The Impact of Japan of William Godwin's Idea.
- Author
-
Shirai, Atsushi
- Subjects
CRITICISM ,ECONOMICS ,LITERATURE - Abstract
From 1783 TO 1834 William Godwin published a succession of ingeniously varied works that were widely and vehemently discussed and criticized. During the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods, with the complete defeat of these Englishmen who were spokesmen for reform, Godwin fell out of "extreme notoriety," as William Hazlitt put it in his "The Spirit of the Age." During much of the time that the Western world was arguing the merits of his strikingly individualistic-even anarchistic ideas, Japan was almost entirely isolated intellectually. What has been the impact upon Japanese thinking of a writer so varied and so original as this man? Godwin's ideas first reached Japanese minds with the growth of the study of political economy. Japan had to develop her economy rapidly after being opened to outside trade in 1854. It was not only Adam Smith with whom students of economics became acquainted. Among Japanese theorists on population, discussions of Malthus have always included Godwin's contribution, although the attitudes of these scholars have varied.
- Published
- 1970
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
36. THE RESIDUAL CLAIMANT THEORY OF DISTRIBUTION.
- Author
-
Hollander, Jacob H.
- Subjects
DISTRIBUTION (Economic theory) ,LABOR ,CAPITAL ,WEALTH ,INCOME inequality - Abstract
Focuses on the residual claimant theory of distribution. Factors governing the theory; Deductions related to share of laborers and capital included in the theory; Comparison of the theory with that of Adam Smith's theory of distribution.
- Published
- 1903
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
37. THE COMMERCIAL LEGISLATION OF ENGLAND AND THE AMERICAN COLONIES, 1660-1760.
- Author
-
Ashley, W. J.
- Subjects
LEGISLATION ,HISTORIANS ,ECONOMISTS ,ECONOMIC activity ,COLONIES - Abstract
This article presents information on the commercial legislation of England and its effect on the U.S. It also discusses economist Adam Smith's interpretation of economic activity. One cannot be surprised that the first generation of American historians writing, as they did, before the passions provoked by the great struggle had time to subside. It compelled them to pay more than their "fair value" for the commodities they imported, and to accept less than their "fair value" for the commodities they sold. But a like opinion is not confined to American historians, it has come to be very generally accepted by English writers and upon its side it has the authority of the most painstaking and the most widely read of the historians of the eighteenth century. It is, undoubtedly true that the commercial policy of England had established a real opposition of interest between the mother country and her colonies. The laws of England, affecting the trade and industry of the American colonies, fall, with one notable exception to be dealt with by and by, into three groups and it is essential to bear in mind the differences between them. There were, in the first place, the Navigation Laws proper in the second place, what one may conveniently christen the Enumeration Laws and lastly and of far less significance, the Law concerning Manufacture.
- Published
- 1899
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
38. The Preconceptions of Economic Science
- Author
-
Veblen, Thorstein
- Subjects
ECONOMICS ,STATISTICS ,EDUCATION ,MATHEMATICAL models of economics ,MATHEMATICAL economics ,ECONOMIC statistics ,ECONOMETRICS - Abstract
The article examines the preconceptions of economic science. It discusses the view that the economics handed down by the writers of a past generation is substantially a taxonomic science. The author argues that while economic science in the remoter past of its history has been mainly of a taxonomic character, later writers of all schools show a divergence from the taxonomic line and an inclination to make the science a genetic account of the economic life process. The article considers Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations," and his views on economics.
- Published
- 1899
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
39. Alexander Hamilton & Adam Smith.
- Author
-
Bourne, Edward G.
- Subjects
ECONOMISTS ,ECONOMICS ,SAVINGS - Abstract
The article discusses the ideas of Alexander Hamilton and Adam Smith in the field of political economy. It has often been asserted that Hamilton was familiar with Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations." Having previously perused the earlier writers, he now entered upon a deliberate examination of the political economy of Adam Smith. This passage is the common source of the statement that is inferred from the fact that, with the three exceptions following, no indication has been offered of the nature of the evidence upon which it is based. Well-known economist Dunbar, in his sketch of "Economic Science in America, 1776-1876," says that Hamilton, in some parts of his Report on Manufactures, was influenced by his familiarity with Adam Smith, and significantly adds that Hamilton pointed out errors in Smith's concessions to the Physiocrats. Hamilton nowhere in the report mentions Adam Smith's name. Hamilton's remarks on premiums cover the same general points as Smith's, but there is less similarity of language.
- Published
- 1894
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
40. THE PROBLEM OF ECONOMIC EDUCATION.
- Author
-
Newcomb, Simon
- Subjects
ECONOMICS education ,ECONOMISTS ,INTERNATIONAL trade ,COMMERCIAL policy ,BALANCE of trade - Abstract
The article focuses on problems related to economic education. The divergence to which the attention both of economists and the thinking public is now invited runs on lines essentially different from those just marked out. The disagreement in question is not between different classes of economic students or different schools of thought, but between well-established economic conclusions on the one hand and the ideas of the public on the other. These ideas do not spring from a study of the contrast between the present state of industry and that of a century ago, but are as old as the commercial system. One of the most marked points of antagonism between the ideas of the economists since Adam Smith and those which governed the commercial policy of nations before his time is found in the case of foreign trade. Before such a thing as economic science was known arose the theory of the balance of trade. The fundamental doctrine of this theory was that trade was advantageous or disadvantageous to a nation according as the value of its exports exceeded or fell short of the value of its imports.
- Published
- 1893
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
41. THE INTERPRETATION OF RICARDO.
- Author
-
Patten, Simon N.
- Subjects
ECONOMISTS ,ECONOMICS ,SOCIAL scientists - Abstract
The article discusses the interpretation of writings of economist David Ricardo. Ever since the death of Ricardo there has been an increasing interest in him and his writings. For all deductive economists his theories have had a charm which those of no later writer possess. There are many whose reasoning is more perfect, many whose ideas are more clearly expressed; but few have attained the commanding position of Ricardo in economic theory. In the early part of the year 1815 a remarkable essay by Thomas Robert Malthus appeared, which opened up the discussion of the theory of rent; and a few months later came a still more remarkable essay by Ricardo, in which the position of the modern economist was clearly represented. There is a marked difference between the essay of Malthus and that of Ricardo. The character of the change which Ricardo brought about in economics becomes more manifest when one compares the position of Malthus with that taken by Ricardo in his Political Economy, published two years later. Ricardo's thinking on economic subjects begins with a study of the conditions which determine the rate of profits, and about this all of his system is constructed. Adam Smith had said that the rate of profits was lowered by the competition of producers.
- Published
- 1893
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
42. ADAM SMITH'S LECTURES ON RHETORIC: AN HISTORICAL ASSESSMENT.
- Author
-
Howell, Wilbur Samuel
- Subjects
RHETORIC ,SCHOLARS - Abstract
Presents an historical assessment of historian Adam Smith's lectures on rhetoric. Topics emphasized by Smith in his lectures; Comments of three contemporaries on Smith's lectures; Educational background of Smith.
- Published
- 1969
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
43. Adam Smith is Pleased.
- Author
-
Mitchell, Wesley C.
- Subjects
BOOKS ,LIBRARIES ,WEALTH ,EMPLOYEES - Abstract
The article focuses on the book "Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations," written by Adam Smith and edited by Edwin Cannan. When the author's medium put him into touch with Adam Smith, the sage was chortling over the Modern Library edition of "The Wealth of Nations." Smith professed a livelier satisfaction in it than in any other edition since the very first. The author ventured to express surprise. Mankind's interest in his work must be an old story to him. The book mentions that common laborers in the province of New York were earning the equivalent of two shillings sterling a day, substantially more than the London rate in 1776.
- Published
- 1937
44. READERS REPORT.
- Subjects
LETTERS to the editor ,SELF-interest ,AUTOMOBILE sales & prices - Abstract
Several letters to the editor are presented in response to articles in the October 1962 issues including "Radical return to Adam Smith," by Milton Friedman in the October 6 issue, "Washington outlook" in the October 6 issue, and "A car for every purse or whim" in the October 13 issue.
- Published
- 1962
45. A science returns to the fold.
- Subjects
ECONOMICS ,BUSINESSMEN ,ECONOMISTS - Abstract
The article reports that U.S economists and businessmen are starting to recognize the importance of economics. It emphasizes that a practice must be based on theory and a theory must be taken into practice to benefit both businessmen and economists. It states that as economics become more respectable, professors tend to take over while businessmen are forced to give up. It features some of the known business economists including Sir Thomas Gresham, Sir William Petty, and professor Adam Smith.
- Published
- 1962
46. SMITH, ADAM.
- Author
-
GODWIN, PARKE
- Subjects
- SMITH, Adam, 1723-1790, SMITH, James Edward, SMITH, James, SMITH, Horace, SMITH, John, SMITH, William Sidney
- Abstract
An encyclopedia entry for Adam Smith, Charlotte Smith, Sir James Edward Smith, James Smith, Horace Smith, John Smith, and Sir William Sidney Smith is presented. Adam Smith was a moralist and political economic author born in Kirkaldy, Scotland in 1723. Charlotte Smith was a novelist and poet in England. James and Horace Smith were the sons of solicitor Robert Smith. John Smith was known as an adventurer born in Lincolnshire, England. William Sidney Smith served as a British admiral.
- Published
- 1853
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