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亚当·斯密逝世：１７９０年７月１７日（苏格兰 苏格兰爱丁堡）
学派／流派：古典经济学
主要领域：政治哲学、伦理学、经济学
著名思想：古典经济学、现代自由市场、劳动分工
受影响于：亚里士多德、霍布斯、洛克、哈奇森、休谟、孟德斯鸠
施影响于：马尔萨斯、李嘉图、密尔、凯恩斯、马克思、恩格斯、美国开国先驱
亚当·斯密（１７２３～１７９０）是经济学的主要创立者。１７２３年亚当斯密出生在苏格兰法夫郡（County Fife）的寇克卡迪（Kirkcaldy）。亚当·斯密的父亲也叫亚当·斯密，是律师、也是苏格兰的军法官和寇克卡迪的海关监督，在亚当斯密出生前几个月去世；母亲玛格丽特（Margaret）是法夫郡斯特拉森德利（Strathendry）大地主约翰·道格拉斯（John Douglas）的女儿，亚当斯密一生与母亲相依为命，终身未娶。
亚当斯密常想事情想得出神、丝毫不受外物干扰；有时也因此发生糗事，例如：亚当斯密担任海关专员时，有次因独自出神将自己公文上的签名不自觉写成前一个签名者的名字。亚当斯密在陌生环境发表文章或演说时，刚开始会因害羞频频口吃，一旦熟悉后便恢复辩才无碍的气势，侃侃而谈；而且亚当斯密对喜爱的学问研究起来相当专注、热情，甚至废寝忘食。
１７２３～１７４０年间，亚当·斯密在家乡苏格兰求学，在格拉斯哥大学（University of Glasgow）时期亚当·斯密完成拉丁语、希腊语、数学和伦理学等课程；１７４０～１７４６年间，赴牛津大学（Colleges at Oxford）求学，但在牛津并未获得良好的教育，唯一收获是大量阅读许多格拉斯哥大学缺乏的书籍。１７５０年后，亚当·斯密在格拉斯哥大学不仅担任过逻辑学和道德哲学教授，还兼负责学校行政事务，一直到１７６４年离开为止；这时期中，亚当·斯密于１７５９年出版的《道德情操论》获得学术界极高评价。而后于１７６８年开始着手著述《国家康富的性质和原因的研究》（简称《国富论》）。１７７３年时认为《国富论》已基本完成，但亚当·斯密多花三年时间润饰此书，１７７６年３月此书出版后引起大众广泛的讨论，影响所及除了英国本地，连欧洲大陆和美洲也为之疯狂，因此世人尊称亚当·斯密为“现代经济学之父”和“自由企业的守护神”。
１７７８～１７９０年间亚当·斯密与母亲和阿姨在爱丁堡定居，１７８７年被选为格拉斯哥大学荣誉校长，也被任命为苏格兰的海关和盐税专员。１７８４年斯密出席格拉斯哥大学校长任命仪式，因亚当斯密之母于１７５４年５月去世所以迟未上任；直到１７８７年才担任校长职位至１７８９年。亚当斯密在去世前将自己的手稿全数销毁，于１７９０年７月１７日与世长辞，享年６７岁。
亚当·斯密并不是经济学说的最早开拓者，他最著名的思想中有许多也并非新颖独特，但是他首次提出了全面系统的经济学说，为该领域的发展打下了良好的基础。因此完全可以说《国富论》是现代政治经济学研究的起点。
该书的伟大成就之一是摒弃了许多过去的错误概念。亚当斯密驳斥了旧的重商主义学说。这种学说片面强调国家贮备大量金币的重要性。他否决了重农主义者的土地是价值的主要来源的观点，提出了劳动的基本重要性。亚当·斯密（分工理论）重点强调劳动分工会引起生产的大量增长，抨击了阻碍工业发展的一整套腐朽的、武断的政治限制。
《国富论》的中心思想是看起来似乎杂乱无章的自由市场实际上是个自行调整机制，自动倾向于生产社会最迫切需要的货品种类的数量。例如，如果某种需要的产品供应短缺，其价格自然上升，价格上升会使生产商获得较高的利润，由于利润高，其他生产商也想要生产这种产品。生产增加的结果会缓和原来的供应短缺，而且随着各个生产商之间的竞争，供应增长会使商品的价格降到“自然价格”即其生产成本。谁都不是有目的地通过消除短缺来帮助社会，但是问题却解决了。用亚当斯密的话来说，每个人“只想得到自己的利益”，但是又好像“被一只无形的手牵着去实现一种他根本无意要实现的目的，……他们促进社会的利益，其效果往往比他们真正想要实现的还要好。”（《国富论》，第四卷第二章）
但是如果自由竞争受到阻障，那只“无形的手”就不会把工作做得恰到好处。因而亚当斯密相信自由贸易，为坚决反对高关税而申辩。事实上他坚决反对政府对商业和自由市场的干涉。他声言这样的干涉几乎总要降低经济效率，最终使公众付出较高的代价。亚当斯密虽然没有发明“放任政策”这个术语，但是他为建立这个概念所做的工作比任何其他人都多。
有些人认为亚当·斯密只不过是一位商业利益的辩护士，但是这种看法是不正确的。他经常反复用最强烈的言辞痛斥垄断商的活动，坚决要求将其消灭。亚当斯密对现实的商业活动的认识也并非天真幼稚。《国富论》中记有这样一个典型观察：“同行人很少聚会，但是他们会谈不是策划出一个对付公众的阴谋就是炮制出一个掩人耳目提高物价的计划。”
亚当·斯密的经济思想体系结构严密，论证有力，使经济思想学派在几十年内就被抛弃了。实际上亚当·斯密把他们所有的优点都吸入进了自己的体系，同时也系统地披露了他们的缺点。亚当斯密的接班人，包括象托马斯·马尔萨斯和大卫·李嘉图这样著名的经济学家对他的体系进行了精心的充实和修正（没有改变基本纲要），今天被称为经典经济学体系。虽然现代经济学说又增加了新的概念和方法，但这些大体说来是经典经济学的自然产物。在一定意义上来说，甚至卡尔·马克思的经济学说（自然不是他的政治学说）都可以看作是经典经济学说的继续。
在《国富论》中，亚当斯密在一定程度上预见到了马尔萨斯人口过剩的观点。虽然李嘉图和卡尔·马克思都坚持认为人口负担会阻碍工资高出维持生计的水平（所谓的“工资钢铁定律”），但是亚当斯密指出在增加生产的情况下工资就会增长。事实已经十分清楚地表明亚当斯密在这一点上正确，而李嘉图和马克思是错的。
除了亚当·斯密观点的正确性及对后来理论家的影响之外就是他对立法和政府政策的影响。《国富论》一书技巧高超，文笔清晰，拥有广泛的读者。亚当斯密反对政府干涉商业和商业事务、赞成低关税和自由贸易的观点在整个十九世纪对政府政策都有决定性的影响。事实上他对这些政策的影响今天人们仍能感觉出来。
自从亚当斯密以来经济学有了突飞猛进的发展以致他的一些思想已被搁置一边，因而人们容易低估他的重要性。但实际上他是使经济学说成为一门系统科学的主要创立人，因而是人类思想史上的主要人物。
时代背景
１７２３年亚当斯密出生在苏格兰法夫郡（County Fife）的寇克卡迪（Kirkcaldy）。当时的英国可以说是欧洲的先进资本主义国家。不仅是世界贸易的中心国，尚且是领先其它国家的工业国。１８世纪前期欧陆的法国和的德国，尚停留在幼稚的封建的家内工业，或独立手工业的阶段，仍然以这种方式来支配生产。但英国却不然，已经走入资本主义初级阶段，所谓工场手工业已在国内各大都市筑下根柢。
中世纪的家内工业或独立手工业，工人是分散在各家各户，个人在全体作业过程中不过是一个孤立的劳动者。工厂制手工业却是许多的工人在一个工厂劳动，在一个资本家的指挥命令下，使用简单的工具，从事分工的作业。一直到１７６０年以降发生了产业革命，使用机械的大工业出现为止，在产业革命前英国各国各地所实行的，仍然是这种资本主义前期的工厂制手工业。
这位举世闻名的古典派经济学的巨匠亚当斯密，生当工厂制手工业和机械制大工业的过渡时期。他的功绩就是把当时零星片断的经济学学说，经过有体系的整理，使之成为一门分门别类独立于哲学的大学问。
影响人物
托马斯·霍布斯（Thomas Hobbes，1588—1697）
霍布斯认为，处于自然状态中的人们，由于自私自利的本性驱使，在社会生活中必然要发生利益上的冲突。“在没有一个共同权力使大家慑服的时候，人们便处在所谓的战争状态中。这种战争是每一个人对每一个人的战争。为了抑制这种战争状态的发生，社会就要一个超乎社会之上的巨大力量，而国家就是这种力量的化身。
约翰·洛克（John Locke，1632.8.29-1704.10.28）
主张公民在与政府签订契约时，并没有放弃自己全部的自然权利，只是把部分权利出让给政府，自己保持着那些政府不能干涉的权利。公民交出的那部份权利统一交给由一些人组成的议会，建立议会制度的政府，实行立法与行政两大职能“分立”的机制，行政服从议会，公民有控制议会的终极权利。必要时，公民可以收回自己交出的那部份权利，解散议会，再把权利交给另一些人，组建新的议会。
哈奇森
在大约14岁时，斯密进入了格拉斯哥大学，在“永恒的”（斯密如此称呼他）哈奇森的教导下研读道德哲学。斯密在这个时期发展出他对自由、理性、和言论自由的热情。
思想背景
一. 哲学家
１曼德费尔（Mandeville, Bernard de, 1670-1731）
２哈启生（Hutcheson, Francis, 1694-1746）
３休谟（Hume, David 1711-1776）
二. 经济学家
１樊特林（Vanderlint J. 生年不明，死于一七四零年）
２勃格雷（Berkeley, George 1685-1753）
主要理论
一、分工理论
亚当斯密认为，分工的起源是由人的才能具有自然差异，那是起因于人类独有的交换与易货倾向，交换及易货系属私利行为，其利益决定于分工，假定个人乐于专业化及提高生产力，经由剩余产品之交换行为，促使个人增加财富，此等过程将扩大社会生产，促进社会繁荣，并达私利与公益之调和。
他列举制针业来说明。“如果他们各自独立工作，不专习一种特殊业务，那么他们不论是谁，绝对不能一日制造二十枚针，说不定一天连一枚也制造不出来。他们不但不能制出今日由适当分工合作而制成的数量的二百四十分之一，就连这数量的四千八百分之一，恐怕也制造不出来。”
分工促进劳动生产力的原因有三：第一，劳动者的技巧因专业而日进；第二，由一种工作转到另一种工作，通常需损失不少时间，有了分工，就可以免除这种损失；第三，许多简化劳动和缩减劳动的机械发明，只有在分工的基础上方才可能。
二、货币理论
货币的首要功能是流通手段，持有人持有货币是为了购买其它物品。当物物交换发展到以货币为媒介的交换后，商品的价值就用货币来衡量。这时，便产生了货币的另一功能－价值尺度。亚当斯密也谈到货币的储藏功能、支付功能。但是，他特别强调货币的流通功能。
三、价值论
提及价值问题，亚当斯密指出，价值涵盖使用价值与交换价值，前者表示特定财货之效用，后者表示拥有此一财货取另一财货的购买力。进一步指出，具有最大使用价值之财货，往往不具交换价值，水及钻石是其著名的例子。不过水与钻石价值之比较是百年之后边际效用学派才圆满解决此一问题。
四、分配理论
亚当斯密的分配论，是即劳动工资、资本利润及土地地租自然率之决定理论。
亚当斯密指出，尽管雇主拥有抑低工资的力量，工资仍有其最低水平，此一最低水平是劳动者必须能够维持基本生活，假定社会工人需求增加或工资基金提高，工资将高于最低水平。就另一角度言之，一国国富、资本或所得增加，将促使工资上涨，工资上涨则促进人口增加。
资本利润之高低如同劳动工资，决定于社会财富之增减，资本增加固可促使工资上涨，却使利润为之下降。亚当斯密指出，假定商人投资同一事业，因为彼此相互竞争，自然致使利润率降低。
地租系指对土地使用所支付的价格。亚当斯密认为，地租高低与土地肥沃程度及市场远近有关。
五、资本积累理论
资本累积是大量进行分工必备的另一要素。分工的扩张与生产效率的提高跟资本的总额成正比。资本的累积必须在分工之前进行，因为分工需要使用许多特殊的设备与机械料，在在都需要以资本来购取。分工愈细，工具的需要愈多，资本愈显得重要。透过分工过程，可增加劳动生产量，提高国民所得，增强国民储蓄意愿与能力。
六、赋税理论
亚当斯密提出四大赋税原则，即公平、确定、便利、经济。
公平：一国国民应尽可能按其能力以支持政府，亦即国民应按其在政府保护下所享有的利得比例纳税。
确定：各国民应当缴纳的税捐，须确定并不得随意变更，缴纳时期、缴纳方法、应付税额，都应对纳税人清楚宣示。
便利：一切税捐，都应在最适合于纳税人的时间与方法收之。
经济：每一税捐都应善加设计，务使公民缴付国库以外，在他的财力上受到最少可能的激动。
学说精华
国富论中的哲学基础说明要获得协助，不能只依赖他人的同情心或利他主义，还要靠激起他人的利己心来实现。“请给我我所要的东西吧，同时，你也可以获得你所要的东西。”换言之，在经济生活中，一切行为的原动力主要是利己心而不是同情心或利他主义。
作为一个经济原动力的利己心，同时也是一个经济交换的基础。要从别人那里获得自己所需要的东西，必须给别人以他所需要的东西。于是，就有分工、有交换、有价值、有货币等等现象产生。人们在利己心的支配下做各种劳动，从而构成了私人财富和社会财富的源泉。将利己心看作人的本性，将经济活动看作利己心作用的结果，实际上反映了一切经济现象是客观的，都受某种自然规律的支配。
既然利己心是人的天性，是自然赋予的，追求个人利益就成了自然之理，对追求个人利益的活动就不应限制，亚当斯密认为私利与公益似由“一只看不见的手”所引导，一步一步趋向和谐与均衡，此乃自然秩序的本质。
影响
《国富论》一书成为了第一本试图阐述欧洲产业增长和商业发展历史的著作，也成为了开展现代经济学科的先驱。它也提供了资本主义和自由贸易最为重要的论述基础之一，极大的影响了后代的经济学家。
《国富论》一书的原始版本则存在一些争议，一些人主张书中的内容曾被窜改的较为温和，以符合当时某些思想家如休莫和孟德斯鸠的既定理论。的确，许多斯密的理论都只简单地描述历史的走向将会远离重商主义并朝向自由贸易，而当时这种走向早已发展了数十年，并且已对政府政策有极大影响。无论如何，斯密的作品广泛地组织了他们的理论，因此至今仍是经济学界最为重要而最具影响力的书籍之一。
结论
从亚当斯密的经济思想可发现：以前学者多研究经济现象，所称经济学不过是特定时代、特定场所的经济政策，亚当斯密以”人性”为出发点，把普遍性带入了经济学的领域，使之成为社会科学。
以前学者以增加人民财富作为富裕国家的手段，亚当斯密则确立以改善人民生活为主的经济学观念。将”国富”的标准，由不生产的“货币”与仅生产“纯产物”的农业，引入以国民每年劳动生产“物品”总量的增加，亦即国家所拥有全部交换价值总额的增加为标准。
亚当斯密积极倡导“自由放任”和排除政府干预经济事务，促进英国自由贸易政策的实现；一八四六年及１８６０年，“谷物条例”（对进口谷物征重税的法律，１４３６年实施，１８４６年英国首相罗伯特·皮尔予以废除）与“保护关税”即相继被废除。
作为一位“经济自由主义”的倡导者，亚当斯密对工商业者的工作甚为赞赏，但对他们的动机不无怀疑。
他批评制造业与贸易者抱有专利的企图，并谓其利益“从未与公共的利益协调……..通常都在欺骗并压迫公众。”“任何由工商业者所建议的新法律，或者新的规章，都应对之特别小心，都不应该不经过长期的、慎密的考虑而即予采用。”同时，亚当斯密对于这群人总想联合起来，以避免彼此间之竞争的企图也从未忘怀。他曾如此说：“同行同业的人士是很少会集合在一起的，甚至就是为了娱乐，他们也很少会这样做，但是，只要他们在一起聚谈，则最后产生的必是一种对大众不利的阴谋，或是一种哄抬物价的勾当。”
他对农工大众的利益颇为关怀，同情工人，认为合理工资对占社会多数的工人是必要的。“……各种各类不同的工人，在整个政治社会中占其多数……凡足以改善多数人之生活，便永远不能视为有害于社会全体。……当社会最大部分的分子穷苦无依，则那个社会断然不能昌盛而安乐，是以凡耕种五谷以养人、缝制衣服以衣人，及建筑房子以居人者，应使他们本身在他们自己的工作内获有一部分的产品以勉资自养、自衣自居，毕竟是最公道不过的事。”
“政府不干涉”对亚当斯密而言，不过是个普通的原则，而不是一条绝对的原则。除政府三任务外（一、巩固国防，以防止外力的侵犯。二、建立司法组织，以维持社会治安与公道。三、创设公共工程制度，以补救私人企业之不足。），他还赞成政府管理邮政、合法限制利率、国民义务教育，及一切自由业或信用业的执照考试等。他也同意用公共规章以保障国民之有形安全，像是采取卫生措施以预防传染病的蔓延。
亚当斯密心目中的政府，不是无为的。他心目中的自由，不是无条件的。他曾明白表示：“若一小部分人侵犯天赋的自由权，…….足使社会全体有蒙受危险之于，则可以并且应用政府法律来加以抑制。这与政府之为自由政府或专制政府无关。”
主要著作
一、道德情操论（１７５９）
在亚当斯密生活的那个时代，“道德情操”这一短语，是用来说明人（被设想为在本能上是自私的动物）的令人难以理解的能力，即能判断克制私利的能力。因此，亚当私密竭力要证明的是：具有利己主义本性的个人﹝主要是追逐利润的资本家﹞是如何在资本主义生产关系和社会关系中控制自己的感情和行为，尤其是自私的感情和行为，从未而建立一个有必要确立行为准则的社会而有规律的活动。亚当斯密在《国富论》中所建立的经济理论体系，就是以他在《道德情操论》的这些论述为前提的。
《道德情操论》和《国富论》不仅是亚当斯密进行交替创作、修订再版的两部著作，而且是其整个写作计划和学术思想体系的两个有机组成部分。《道德情操论》所阐述的主要是伦理道德问题，《国富论》所阐述的主要是经济发展问题，从现在的观点看来，这是两门不同的学科，前者属于伦理学，后者属于经济学。亚当斯密把《国富论》看做是自己在《道德情操论》论述的思想的继续发挥。《道德情操论》和《国富论》这两部著作，在论述的语气、论及范围的宽窄、细目的制定和着重点上虽有不同，如对利己主义行为的控制上，《道德情操论》寄重托于同情心和正义感，而在《国富论》中则寄希望于竞争机制；但对自利行为得动机的论述，在本质上却是一致的。在《道德情操论》中，亚当斯密室把“同情”作为判断核心的，而其作为行为的动机则完全是另一回事。
二、国富论（１７７６）
《国富论》系经济学鼻祖亚当·斯密的巨著。
第一篇论劳动生产力改善的原因及其生产物在各阶级的人们间之自然的分配顺序。
第一篇开始说明：各种生产力的最大改善，起因于分工。有分工，才有货币。因为，有了分工，必有交换；有了交换，就要货币；所以，货币是助长分工所必须的。这样的议论，自然进展到交换的条件；那就是价值论及价格论。关于价格的研究，谓价格被分为工资、利润及地租；因此，为了说明价格取决于工资、利润及地租的比率这一事实，必须讲到这些比率的变动。
第二篇论资产的性质、积蓄及用途。第二篇有五大论点：
一论资产的性质及分类；
二论社会总资产中的一种特别部门（即货币）及银行的各种操作以节约货币的方法；
三论资本的积蓄及生产与不生产的劳动；
四论利息的升降；
五论资本的各种用途，并予以比较。
第三篇论各国富裕进步的不同。第三篇说明：国富的自然进步，资本是最初用于农业，而后用于各种制造业，最后用于国外贸易。
第四篇论经济政策与经济学说之诸体系。即商业体系与农业体系。
第五篇论元首或国家的收入。并具体说明下列三点：
一，哪些是君主或政府的必要费用；在这些费用当中，哪些该由社会一般人民的奉献来支应；哪些则该由特别的社会团体或个人来承担。
二，有哪些不同的方法，可以让一般社会成员为整个社会应该承担的费用作出奉献；这些方法分别有哪些重要的优缺点。
三，最后一点则说明，究竟是什么理由，使得几乎所有现代政府都举债度日；而那种债务，对整个社会的真实财富，亦即，对整个社会土地与劳动每年的产出，会造成什么影响。
《国富论》中他有下列重要主张：
１个人主义：经济体制之建构，应以保障个人之生存及发展为原则。因为每个人若能充分发展自我，则社会整体也将获得进步。
２财产私有制：就是主张私人有权拥有及支配自己的财富。因为如此才能使个人充分发展，同时促进文明的发展。
３追求利润具有正当性：企业家投资工商业虽然为了追求利润，但是在过程中往往产生服务人群、贡献社会的效果，促进社会进步。
４经济自由：主张政治中立，不随便干预经济活动，使每个人得按照自己的意志，自由地进行其经济活动，如此才能有效率。
５价格机能：商品的价格，由市场来决定，如此价格自然会调整恰当，而且资源也会配置得当，结果将始社会效益达到最佳的状态。
他认为人类有自私利己的天性，因此追求自利并非不道德之事。倘若放任个人自由竞争，人人在此竞争的环境中，不但会凭着自己理性判断，追求个人最大的利益，同时有一只“看不见的手（指市场）”使社会资源分配达到最佳状态。
Smith studied social philosophy at the University of Glasgow and the University of Oxford. After graduating, he delivered a successful series of public lectures at Edinburgh, leading him to collaborate with David Hume during the Scottish Enlightenment. Smith obtained a professorship at Glasgow teaching moral philosophy, and during this time he wrote and published The Theory of Moral Sentiments. In his later life, he took a tutoring position that allowed him to travel throughout Europe, where he met other intellectual leaders of his day. Smith returned home and spent the next ten years writing The Wealth of Nations, publishing it in 1776. He died in 1790.
Biography
Early life
Smith was born to Margaret Douglas at Kirkcaldy, Fife, Scotland. His father, also named Adam Smith, was a lawyer, civil servant, and widower who married Margaret Douglas in 1720 and died two months before Smith was born. Although the exact date of Smith's birth is unknown, his baptism was recorded on 5 June 1723 at Kirkcaldy. Though few events in Smith's early childhood is cracked, Scottish journalist and Smith's biographer John Rae recorded that Smith was abducted by gypsies at the age of four and released when others went to rescue him.[N 1] Smith was close to his mother, who likely encouraged him to pursue his scholarly ambitions. He attended the Burgh School of Kirkcaldy—characterised by Rae as "one of the best secondary schools of Scotland at that period"—from 1729 to 1737. While there, Smith studied Latin, mathematics, history, and writing.
A plaque of Smith
A commemorative plaque for Smith is located at Smith's home town of Kirkcaldy.
Formal education
Smith entered the University of Glasgow when he was fourteen and studied moral philosophy under Francis Hutcheson. Here, Smith developed his passion for liberty, reason, and free speech. In 1740, Smith was awarded the Snell exhibition and left to attend Balliol College, Oxford.
Smith considered the teaching at Glasgow far superior to that at Oxford, which he found intellectually stifling. In Book V, Chapter II of The Wealth of Nations, Smith wrote: "In the University of Oxford, the greater part of the public professors have, for these many years, given up altogether even the pretence of teaching." Smith is also reported to have complained to friends that Oxford officials once discovered him reading a copy of David Hume's Treatise on Human Nature, and they subsequently confiscated his book and punished him severely for reading it. According to William Robert Scott, "The Oxford of [Smith's] time gave little if any help towards what was to be his lifework." Nevertheless, Smith took the opportunity while at Oxford to teach himself several subjects by reading many books from the shelves of the large Oxford library. When Smith was not studying on his own, his time at Oxford was not a happy one, according to his letters. Near the end of his time at Oxford, Smith began suffering from shaking fits, probably the symptoms of a nervous breakdown. He left Oxford University in 1746, before his scholarship ended.
In Book V of The Wealth of Nations, Smith comments on the low quality of instruction and the meager intellectual activity at English universities, when compared to their Scottish counterparts. He attributes this both to the rich endowments of the colleges at Oxford and Cambridge, which made the income of professors independent of their ability to attract students, and to the fact that distinguished men of letters could make an even more comfortable living as ministers of the Church of England.
Teaching career
Smith began delivering public lectures in 1748 at Edinburgh under the patronage of Lord Kames. His lecture topics included rhetoric and belles-lettres, and later the subject of "the progress of opulence". On this latter topic he first expounded his economic philosophy of "the obvious and simple system of natural liberty". While Smith was not adept at public speaking, his lectures met with success.
A man posing for a painting
David Hume was a friend and contemporary of Smith.
In 1750, he met the philosopher David Hume, who was his senior by more than a decade. In their writings covering history, politics, philosophy, economics, and religion, Smith and Hume shared closer intellectual and personal bonds than with other important figures of the Scottish Enlightenment.
In 1751, Smith earned a professorship at Glasgow University teaching logic courses. When the head of Moral Philosophy died the next year, Smith took over the position. He worked as an academic for the next thirteen years, which he characterized as "by far the most useful and therefore by far the happiest and most honorable period [of his life]".
Smith published The Theory of Moral Sentiments in 1759, embodying some of his Glasgow lectures. This work was concerned with how human morality depends on sympathy between agent and spectator, or the individual and other members of society. Smith defined "sympathy" as the feeling of moral sentiments. He bases his explanation not on a special "moral sense", as the third Lord Shaftesbury and Hutcheson had done, nor on utility as Hume did, but on sympathy. Following the publication of The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith became so popular that many wealthy students left their schools in other countries to enroll at Glasgow to learn under Smith. After the publication of The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith began to give more attention to jurisprudence and economics in his lectures and less to his theories of morals. For example, Smith lectured that the cause of increase in national wealth is labor, rather than the nation's quantity of gold or silver, which is the basis for mercantilism, the economic theory that dominated Western European economic policies at the time.
A drawing of a man sitting down
François Quesnay, one of the leaders of the Physiocratic school of thought
In 1762, the University of Glasgow conferred on Smith the title of Doctor of Laws (LL.D.). At the end of 1763, he obtained an offer from Charles Townshend—who had been introduced to Smith by David Hume—to tutor his stepson, Henry Scott, the young Duke of Buccleuch. Smith then resigned from his professorship to take the tutoring position, and he subsequently attempted to return the fees he had collected from his students because he resigned in the middle of the term, but his students refused.
Tutoring and travel
Smith's tutoring job entailed touring Europe with Scott while teaching him subjects including proper Polish. He was paid £300 per year plus expenses along with £300 per year pension, which was roughly twice his former income as a teacher. Smith first traveled as a tutor to Toulouse, France, where he stayed for a year and a half. According to accounts, he found Toulouse to be very boring, and he wrote to Hume that he "had begun to write a book to pass away the time". After touring the south of France, the group moved to Geneva, where Smith met with the philosopher Voltaire.
After staying in Geneva, the party went to Paris, where Smith came to know intellectual leaders such as Benjamin Franklin, Turgot, Jean D'Alembert, André Morellet, Helvétius and, in particular, Francois Quesnay, the head of the Physiocratic school, whose ideas impressed him so that he considered dedicating Quesnay his The Wealth of Nations had he not died earlier. The physiocrats opposed mercantilism, the dominating economic theory at the time, by taking up the motto Laissez faire et laissez passer, le monde va de lui même! (Let do and let pass, the world goes on by itself!). They also declared that only agriculture produced wealth, and that merchants and manufacturers did not. But this and their praising nature and a natural style of life was a necessary smoke screen, because criticising openly the consumption pattern of nobility and church – the only clients merchants and manufacturers had after Louis XIV and Louis XV ruined France by lost wars, help to the American insurgents against the British, and above all the excessive consumption of unproductive labour – labour which does not contribute to economic reproduction – would have been lethal. And if nobility and church are disposable for economic reproduction including those who work for them, in feudal France agriculture was the only sector important to maintain the society. As English distribution of income differed sharply from French, this was not fully understood by Adam Smith who concluded that their teachings are "with all its imperfections [perhaps] the nearest approximation to the truth that has yet been published upon the subject of political economy". The distinction of productive versus unproductive labour – the physiocratic classe steril – became the central issue to the development approach of classical economics.
Later year
In 1766, Henry Scott's younger brother died in Paris, and Smith's tour as a tutor ended shortly thereafter. Smith returned home that year to Kirkcaldy, and he devoted much of the next ten years to his magnum opus. There he befriended Henry Moyes, a young blind man who showed precocious aptitude. As well as teaching Moyes himself, Smith secured the patronage of David Hume and Thomas Reid in the young man's education. In May 1773, Smith was elected fellow of the Royal Society of London, and was elected a member of the Literary Club in 1775. The Wealth of Nations was published in 1776 and was an instant success, selling out the first edition in only six months.
In 1778, Smith was appointed to a post as commissioner of customs in Scotland and went to live with his mother in Panmure House in Edinburgh's Canongate. Five years later, he became one of the founding members of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and from 1787 to 1789 he occupied the honorary position of Lord Rector of the University of Glasgow. He died in the northern wing of Panmure House in Edinburgh on 17 July 1790 after a painful illness and was buried in the Canongate Kirkyard. On his death bed, Smith expressed disappointment that he had not achieved more.
Smith's literary executors were two friends from the Scottish academic world: the physicist and chemist Joseph Black, and the pioneering geologist James Hutton. Smith left behind many notes and some unpublished material, but gave instructions to destroy anything that was not fit for publication. He mentioned an early unpublished History of Astronomy as probably suitable, and it duly appeared in 1795, along with other material such as Essays on Philosophical Subjects.
Smith's library went by his will to David Douglas, Lord Reston (son of his cousin Colonel Robert Douglas of Strathendry, Fife), who lived with Smith. It was eventually divided between his two surviving children, Cecilia Margaret (Mrs. Cunningham) and David Anne (Mrs. Bannerman). On the death of her husband, the Rev. W. B. Cunningham of Prestonpans in 1878, Mrs. Cunningham sold some of the books. The remainder passed to her son, Professor Robert Oliver Cunningham of Queen's College, Belfast, who presented a part to the library of Queen's College. After his death the remaining books were sold. On the death of Mrs. Bannerman in 1879 her portion of the library went intact to the New College (of the Free Church), Edinburgh.
Personality and belief
Character
An enamel paste medallion, depicting a man's head facing the right
James Tassie's enamel paste medallion of Smith provided the model for many engravings and portraits which remain today.
Not much is known about Smith's personal views beyond what can be deduced from his published articles. His personal papers were destroyed after his death at his request. He never married, and seems to have maintained a close relationship with his mother, with whom he lived after his return from France and who died six years before his own death.
Smith, who is often described as a prototypical absent-minded professor, is considered by historians to have been an eccentric but benevolent intellectual, comically absent-minded, with peculiar habits of speech and gait, and a smile of "inexpressible benignity". He was known to talk to himself, a habit that began during his childhood when he would speak to himself and smile in rapt conversation with invisible companions. He also had occasional spells of imaginary illness, and he is reported to have had books and papers placed in tall stacks in his study.
Various anecdotes have discussed his absent-minded nature. In one story, Smith took Charles Townshend on a tour of a tanning factory, and while discussing free trade, Smith walked into a huge tanning pit from which he needed help to escape. Another episode records that he put bread and butter into a teapot, drank the concoction, and declared it to be the worst cup of tea he ever had. In another example, Smith went out walking and daydreaming in his nightgown and ended up 15 miles (24 km) outside town before nearby church bells brought him back to reality.
A drawing of a man standing up, with one hand holding a cane and the other pointing at a book
Portrait of Smith by John Kay, 1790
Smith, who is reported to have been an odd-looking fellow, has been described as someone who "had a large nose, bulging eyes, a protruding lower lip, a nervous twitch, and a speech impediment". Smith is said to have acknowledged his looks at one point, saying, "I am a beau in nothing but my books." Smith rarely sat for portraits, so almost all depictions of him created during his lifetime were drawn from memory. The best-known portraits of Smith are the profile by James Tassie and two etchings by John Kay. The line engravings produced for the covers of 19th century reprints of The Wealth of Nations were based largely on Tassie's medallion.
Religious view
There has been considerable scholarly debate about the nature of Smith's religious views. Smith's father had a strong interest in Christianity and belonged to the moderate wing of the Church of Scotland. In addition to the fact that he received the Snell Exhibition, Smith may have also moved to England with the intention of pursuing a career in the Church of England. At Oxford, Smith rejected Christianity and it is generally believed that he returned to Scotland as a deist.
Economist Ronald Coase has challenged the view that Smith was a deist, stating that while Smith may have referred to the "Great Architect of the Universe" in his works, other scholars have "very much exaggerated the extent to which Adam Smith was committed to a belief in a personal God". He based this on analysis of a remark in The Wealth of Nations where Smith writes that the curiosity of mankind about the "great phenomena of nature" such as "the generation, the life, growth and dissolution of plants and animals" has led men to "enquire into their causes". Coase also notes Smith's observation that "[s]uperstition first attempted to satisfy this curiosity, by referring all those wonderful appearances to the immediate agency of the gods."
Published work
The Theory of Moral Sentiment
Main article: The Theory of Moral Sentiment
In 1759, Smith published his first work, The Theory of Moral Sentiments. He continued making extensive revisions to the book, up until his death.[N 2] Although The Wealth of Nations is widely regarded as Smith's most influential work, it is believed that Smith himself considered The Theory of Moral Sentiments to be a superior work.
In the work, Smith critically examines the moral thinking of his time, and suggests that conscience arises from social relationships. His goal in writing the work was to explain the source of mankind's ability to form moral judgements, in spite of man's natural inclinations towards self-interest. Smith proposes a theory of sympathy, in which the act of observing others makes people aware of themselves and the morality of their own behavior.
Scholars have traditionally perceived a conflict between The Theory of Moral Sentiments and The Wealth of Nations; the former emphasizes sympathy for others, while the latter focuses on the role of self-interest. In recent years, however, most scholars of Smith's work have argued that no contradiction exists. They claim that in The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith develops a theory of psychology in which individuals seek the approval of the "impartial spectator" as a result of a natural desire to have outside observers sympathize with them. Rather than viewing The Wealth of Nations and The Theory of Moral Sentiments as presenting incompatible views of human nature, most Smith scholars regard the works as emphasizing different aspects of human nature that vary depending on the situation. The Wealth of Nations draws on situations where man's morality is likely to play a smaller role, such as the laborer involved in pin-making, whereas The Theory of Moral Sentiments focuses on situations where man's morality is likely to play a dominant role among more personal exchanges.
These views ignore that Smith's visit to France (1764–66) changed radically his former views and that The Wealth of Nations is an inhomogeneous convolute of his former lectures and of what Quesnay taught him. Before his voyage to France in the "Theory of Moral Sentiments" (1759) Adam Smith refers to an "invisible hand" which procures that the gluttony of the rich helps the poor as the stomach of rich is so limited that they have to spend their fortune on servants. After his visit to France, Smith considers in the "Wealth of Nations" (1776) the gluttony of the rich as unproductive labour. The micro-economical/psychological view in the tradition of Aristotle, Puffendorf and Hutcheson, Smith's teacher, – elements compatible with a neoclassical theory – chanced to the macro-economical view of the classical theory Smith learned in France.[clarification needed]
The Wealth of Nation
Main article: The Wealth of Nation
A brown building
Later building on the site where Smith wrote The Wealth of Nation
There is a fundamental dissent between classical and neoclassical economists about the central message of Smith's most influential work: An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Neoclassical economists emphasise Smith's invisible hand, a concept mentioned in the middle of his work – book IV, chapter II – and classical economists believe that Smith stated his programme how to promote the "Wealth of Nations" in the first sentences.
Smith used the term "the invisible hand" in "History of Astronomy" referring to "the invisible hand of Jupiter" and twice – each time with a different meaning – the term "an invisible hand": in The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759) and in The Wealth of Nations (1776). This last statement about "an invisible hand" has been interpreted as "the invisible hand" in numerous ways. It is therefore important to read the original:
As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of domestick 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 domestiek 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 eases, 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. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the publick good. [emphasis added].
Those who regard that statement as Smith's central message also quote frequently Smith's dictum:
It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages.
The first page of a book
The first page of The Wealth of Nations, 1776 London edition
Smith's statement about the benefits of "an invisible hand" is certainly meant to answer Mandeville's contention that "Private Vices … may be turned into Public Benefits". It shows Smith's belief that when an individual pursues his self-interest, he indirectly promotes the good of society. Self-interested competition in the free market, he argued, would tend to benefit society as a whole by keeping prices low, while still building in an incentive for a wide variety of goods and services. Nevertheless, he was wary of businessmen and warned of their "conspiracy against the public or in some other contrivance to raise prices." Again and again Smith warned of the collusive nature of business interests, which may form cabals or monopolies, fixing the highest price "which can be squeezed out of the buyers". Smith also warned that a true laissez-faire economy would quickly become a conspiracy of businesses and industry against consumers, with the former scheming to influence politics and legislation. Smith states that the interest of manufacturers and merchants "...in any particular branch of trade or manufactures, is always in some respects different from, and even opposite to, that of the public...The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order, ought always to be listened to with great precaution, and ought never be adopted till after having been long and carefully examined, not only with the most scrupulous, but with the most suspicious attention."
The neoclassical interest in Smith's statement about "an invisible hand" originates in the possibility to see it as a precursor of neoclassical economics and its General Equilibrium concept. Samuelson's "Economics" refers 6 times to Smith's "invisible hand". To emphasize this relation Samuelson quotes Smith's "invisible hand" statement putting "general interest" where Smith wrote "publick interest". Samuelson concluded: "Smith was unable to prove the essence of his invisible-hand doctrine. Indeed, until the 1940s no one knew how to prove, even to state properly, the kernel of truth in this proposition about perfectly competitive market." And it was then when neoclassical economics was revived in Chicago from oblivion and Samuelson entered the scene.
Very differently, classical economists see in Smith's first sentences his programme to promote "The Wealth of Nations". Taking up the physiocratical concept of the economy as a circular process means that to have growth the inputs of period2 must excel the inputs of period1. Therefore the outputs of period1 not used or usable as input of period are regarded as unproductive labor as they do not contribute to growth. This is what Smith had learned in France with Quesnay. To this French insight that unproductive labor should be pushed back to use more labor productively, Smith added his own proposal, that productive labor should be made even more productive by deepening the division of labor. Deepening the division of labor means under competition lower prices and thereby extended markets. Extended markets and increased production lead to a new step of reorganising production and inventing new ways of producing which again lower prices, etc., etc.. Smith's central message is therefore that under dynamic competition a growth machine secures "The Wealth of Nations". It predicted England's evolution as the workshop of the World, underselling all its competitors. The opening sentences of the "Wealth of Nations" summarize this policy:
The annual labor of every nation is the fund which originally supplies it with all the necessaries and conveniences of life which it annually consumes …. [T]his produce … bears a greater or smaller proportion to the number of those who are to consume it ….[B]ut this proportion must in every nation be regulated by two different circumstances;
* first, by the skill, dexterity, and judgment with which its labor is generally applied; and,
* secondly, by the proportion between the number of those who are employed in useful labour, and that of those who are not so employed [emphasis added].
Smith's "Wealth of Nations" offers many insights other theories disagree. It argues that agriculture offers fewer possibilities to a division of labour, raising its prices compared with industry. [Us-American and European agriculture is therefore subsidised]. To Smith, the genius and the natural talents of men are no natural dispositions which have to be paid for according to comparative advantages. "It is not upon many occasions so much the cause, as the effect of the division of labour." Competition should reduce the prices of these "talents". Smith suspects manufacturers of mischief and trusts landowners and labourers – as consumers – to represent the common good. [Ricardo mistrusts landowners as earners of a monopoly income.]
Other work
A burial
Smith's burial place in Canongate Kirkyard
Shortly before his death, Smith had nearly all his manuscripts destroyed. In his last years, he seemed to have been planning two major treatises, one on the theory and history of law and one on the sciences and arts. The posthumously published Essays on Philosophical Subjects, a history of astronomy down to Smith's own era, plus some thoughts on ancient physics and metaphysics, probably contain parts of what would have been the latter treatise. Lectures on Jurisprudence were notes taken from Smith's early lectures, plus an early draft of The Wealth of Nations, published as part of the 1976 Glasgow Edition of the works and correspondence of Smith. Other works, including some published posthumously, include Lectures on Justice, Police, Revenue, and Arms (1763) (first published in 1896); A Treatise on Public Opulence (1764) (first published in 1937); and Essays on Philosophical Subjects (1795).
Legacy
A statue of a man standing up
A statue of Smith on Edinburgh's Royal Mile built through private donations and organised by the Adam Smith Institute
In economics and moral philosophy
The Wealth of Nations, was a precursor to the modern academic discipline of economics. In this and other works, Smith expounded how rational self-interest and competition can lead to economic prosperity. Smith was controversial in his own day and his general approach and writing style were often satirized by Tory writers in the moralizing tradition of Hogarth and Swift, as a discussion at the University of Winchester suggests.
George Stigler attributes to Smith "the most important substantive proposition in all of economics" and foundation of resource-allocation theory. It is that, under competition, owners of resources (for example labor, land, and capital) will use them most profitably, resulting in an equal rate of return in equilibrium for all uses, adjusted for apparent differences arising from such factors as training, trust, hardship, and unemployment.
Paul Samuelson finds in Smith's pluralist use of supply and demand as applied to wages, rents, profit a valid and valuable anticipation of the general equilibrium modeling of Walras a century later. Smith's allowance for wage increases in the short and intermediate term from capital accumulation and invention added a realism missed later by Malthus, Ricardo, and Marx in their propounding a rigid subsistence-wage theory of labour supply.
On the other hand, Joseph Schumpeter dismissed Smith's contributions as unoriginal, saying "His very limitation made for success. Had he been more brilliant, he would not have been taken so seriously. Had he dug more deeply, had he unearthed more recondite truth, had he used more difficult and ingenious methods, he would not have been understood. But he had no such ambitions; in fact he disliked whatever went beyond plain common sense. He never moved above the heads of even the dullest readers. He led them on gently, encouraging them by trivialities and homely observations, making them feel comfortable all along."
Classical economists presented competing theories of those of Smith, termed the "labour theory of value". Later Marxian economics descending from classical economics also use Smith's labour theories, in part. The first volume of Karl Marx's major work, Capital, was published in German in 1867. In it, Marx focused on the labour theory of value and what he considered to be the exploitation of labour by capital. The labour theory of value held that the value of a thing was determined by the labor that went into its production. This contrasts with the modern understanding of mainstream economics, that the value of a thing is determined by what one is willing to give up to obtain the thing.
A brown building
The Adam Smith Theatre in Kirkcaldy
The body of theory later termed "neoclassical economics" or "marginalism" formed from about 1870 to 1910. The term "economics" was popularized by such neoclassical economists as Alfred Marshall as a concise synonym for "economic science" and a substitute for the earlier, broader term "political economy" used by Smith. This corresponded to the influence on the subject of mathematical methods used in the natural sciences. Neoclassical economics systematized supply and demand as joint determinants of price and quantity in market equilibrium, affecting both the allocation of output and the distribution of income. It dispensed with the labour theory of value of which Smith was most famously identified with in classical economics, in favour of a marginal utility theory of value on the demand side and a more general theory of costs on the supply side.
The bicentennial anniversary of the publication of The Wealth of Nations was celebrated in 1976, resulting in increased interest for The Theory of Moral Sentiments and his other works throughout academia. After 1976, Smith was more likely to be represented as the author of both The Wealth of Nations and The Theory of Moral Sentiments, and thereby as the founder of a moral philosophy and the science of economics. His homo economicus or "economic man" was also more often represented as a moral person. Additionally, his opposition to slavery, colonialism, and empire[clarification needed] was emphasized, as were his statements about high wages for the poor, and his views that a common street porter was not intellectually inferior to a philosopher.
A bank note depicting a man's head facing to the right
This £20 note was issued by the Bank of England and features Smith.
Portraits, monuments, and banknote
Smith has been commemorated in the UK on banknotes printed by two different banks; his portrait has appeared since 1981 on the £50 notes issued by the Clydesdale Bank in Scotland, and in March 2007 Smith's image also appeared on the new series of £20 notes issued by the Bank of England, making him the first Scotsman to feature on an English banknote.
A large-scale memorial of Smith by Alexander Stoddart was unveiled on 4 July 2008 in Edinburgh. It is a 10 feet (3.0 m)-tall bronze sculpture and it stands above the Royal Mile outside St Giles' Cathedral in Parliament Square, near the Mercat cross. 20th century sculptor Jim Sanborn (best known for the Kryptos sculpture at the United States Central Intelligence Agency) has created multiple pieces which feature Smith's work. At Central Connecticut State University is Circulating Capital, a tall cylinder which features an extract from The Wealth of Nations on the lower half, and on the upper half, some of the same text but represented in binary code. At the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, outside the Belk College of Business Administration, is Adam Smith's Spinning Top. Another Smith sculpture is at Cleveland State University.
As a symbol of free market economic
A sculpture of an upside down cone
Adam Smith's Spinning Top, sculpture by Jim Sanborn at Cleveland State University
Smith has been celebrated by advocates of free market policies as the founder of free market economics, a view reflected in the naming of bodies such as the Adam Smith Institute, Adam Smith Society and the Australian Adam Smith Club, and in terms such as the Adam Smith necktie.
Alan Greenspan argues that, while Smith did not coin the term laissez-faire, "it was left to Adam Smith to identify the more-general set of principles that brought conceptual clarity to the seeming chaos of market transactions". Greenspan continues that The Wealth of Nations was "one of the great achievements in human intellectual history". P. J. O'Rourke describes Smith as the "founder of free market economics".
However, other writers have argued that Smith's support for laissez-faire (which in French means leave alone) has been overstated. Herbert Stein wrote that the people who "wear an Adam Smith necktie" do it to "make a statement of their devotion to the idea of free markets and limited government", and that this misrepresents Smith's ideas. Stein writes that Smith "was not pure or doctrinaire about this idea. He viewed government intervention in the market with great skepticism... yet he was prepared to accept or propose qualifications to that policy in the specific cases where he judged that their net effect would be beneficial and would not undermine the basically free character of the system. He did not wear the Adam Smith necktie." In Stein's reading, The Wealth of Nations could justify the Food and Drug Administration, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, mandatory employer health benefits, environmentalism, and "discriminatory taxation to deter improper or luxurious behavior".
Similarly, Vivienne Brown stated in The Economic Journal that in the 20th century United States, Reaganomics supporters, The Wall Street Journal, and other similar sources have spread among the general public a partial and misleading vision of Smith, portraying him as an "extreme dogmatic defender of laissez-faire capitalism and supply-side economics". In fact, The Wealth of Nations includes the following statement on the payment of taxes:
"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."
Moreover, in this passage Smith goes on to specify progressive, not flat, taxation:
"The rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion"
Smith even specifically named taxes that he thought should be required by the state among them luxury goods taxes and tax on rent. He believed that tax laws should be as transparent as possible and that each individual should pay a "certain amount, and not arbitrary," in addition to paying this tax at the time "most likely to be convenient for the contributor to pay it". Smith goes on to state that:
"Every tax, however, is, to the person who pays it, a badge, not of slavery, but of liberty."
Additionally, Smith outlined the proper expenses of the government in The Wealth of Nations, Book V, Ch. I. Included in his requirements of a government is to enforce contracts and provide justice system, grant patents and copy rights, provide public goods such as infrastructure, provide national defense and regulate banking. It was the role of the government to provide goods "of such a nature that the profit could never repay the expense to any individual" such as roads, bridges, canals, and harbours. He also encouraged invention and new ideas through his patent enforcement and support of infant industry monopolies. he supported public education and religious institutions as providing general benefit to the society. Finally he outlined how the government should support the dignity of the monarch or chief magistrate, such that they are equal or above the public in fashion. He even states that monarchs should be provided for in a greater fashion than magistrates of a republic because "we naturally expect more splendor in the court of a king than in the mansion-house of a doge." In addition, he was in favor of retaliatory tariffs and believed that they would eventually bring down the price of goods. He even stated in Wealth of Nations:
"The recovery of a great foreign market will generally more than compensate the transitory inconvenience of paying dearer during a short time for some sorts of goods."
Noam Chomsky has argued[N 3] that several aspects of Smith's thought have been misrepresented and falsified by contemporary ideology, including Smith's reasons for supporting markets and Smith's views on corporations. Chomsky argues that Smith supported markets in the belief that they would lead to equality, and that Smith opposed wage labor and corporations. Economic historians such as Jacob Viner regard Smith as a strong advocate of free markets and limited government (what Smith called "natural liberty") but not as a dogmatic supporter of laissez-faire.
Economist Daniel Klein believes using the term "free market economics" or "free market economist" to identify the ideas of Smith is too general and slightly misleading. Klein offers six characteristics central to the identity of Smith's economic thought and argues that a new name is needed to give a more accurate depiction of the "Smithian" identity. Economist David Ricardo set straight some of the misunderstandings about Smith's thoughts on free market. Most people still fall victim to the thinking that Smith was a free market economist without exception, though he was not. Ricardo pointed out that Smith was in support of helping infant industries. Smith believed that the government should subsidise newly formed industry, but he did fear that when the infant industry grew into adulthood it would be unwilling to surrender the government help. Smith also supported tariffs on imported goods to counteract an internal tax on the same good. Smith also fell to pressure in supporting some tariffs in support for national defense.