Adam Smith on Government
I think it is amusing (and not at the same time) that the previous administration and conservatives in general HAD latched on to Adam Smith’s Free Market views as the model for our country to thrive upon. Much like anything else, they were clueless as to what Adam Smith meant and only used small bits and pieces to enrich themselves and their donor friends. As we saw for the past 8 years what the GOP says and it does are 2 entirely different things. I think if you were to ask bush who holds an MBA from one of those elite northern universities, what a free market is and how the government he ruled upon acted in Adam Smith’s Free Market image, his head would explode attempting to answer it.
A while back I had a reading list suggested to me by several of our readers. P.J. O’Rourke’s “Eat the Rich” suggested by Duffy was in it. That book was out so I picked up “On the Wealth of Nations” by the same (conservative, writer for the conservative Weekly Standard) It is essentially an abridged version with a conservative slant of “The wealth of Nations” by Adam Smith. Know thy enemy, as the saying goes…
Part of Adam’s Smiths view of a government was this:
First the duty of protecting the society from the 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…; 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
I guess the GOP skipped over that part of Adam Smith’s Free Market theory
The GOP may not hold true to Adam Smith but liberals skip almost 99% of what Smith had to say.
America has accumulated the greatest economic power house in history based on free enterprise.
The wealth of the last 8 years is wealth that didn’t really exist. It only existed on paper, which we sold to each other for huge profits.
What Smith is talking about is fairness. There is no such thing as a “free” market if information is shared equally.
Wrong again protack. Our success as acountry was based on this premise:
…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.
This and the fact that since we were a virtual island for hundreds of years we didn’t have to worry much about item number 1.
“Rebuild” has that common but dubious affliction. Defending the point by saying “the other” guy is worse… nice argument…
Good luck with your rebuilding…
America has accumulated the greatest economic power house in history based on free enterprise.
And slavery.
I don’t see a problem skipping over 99% of what he said. The past 8 years just showed what “free market” economics does to a country.
In fact skipping over 99 of Smith and 100% of Friedman would do the country a lot of good.
Back to Galbraith baby…and it’s a bout time
I think that rebuilding the Delaware GOP can never be for the interest of any individual, or small number of individuals, to erect and maintain.
America has accumulated the greatest economic power house in history based on free enterprise.
And slavery.
and war
The other thing that people skip over when talking about Adam Smith is that there is a necessary prequel to Wealth called Theory of Moral Sentiments, which pretty much argues that virtue and moral conscience are necessary precursors to a fairly functioning capitalism. The more greed, more avarice, more me common description of Smith’s Wealth of Nations is not only wrong, but tend to be a decent marker of someone who hasn’t read him.
DV,
Keynes
UI, him too 🙂
Cassandra,
and they also skip over he left almost all his wealth to Charity and turned away income from royalty once he found another position somewhere else (think golden parachute)
ahhhhh, it’s sort of like living like Jesus would with the exception of using carpet bombs and phosporous!
America has accumulated the greatest economic power house in history based on free enterprise.
And slavery.
and war
And genocide
Adam Smith also states clearly that real wealth is created by the spending of the masses. In otherwords customers with adequate disposable income are the key, which is our problem at these point in time, worker wages have been lagging behind inflation thanks to union busting and globalization. Creating a system that makes 145 million workers work for less wages and benefits destroys the spending power of the masses and thus destroys wealth.