Quotes About Economics

Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production

A nation is not made welthy by the childish accumulation of shiny metals, but it enriched by the economic prosperity of it's people.

The division of labour, however, so far as it can be introduced, occasions, in every art, a proportionable increase of the productive powers of labour.

As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed, and demand a rent even for its natural produce.

Every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest his own way, and to bring both his industry and capital into competition with those of any other man, or order of men.

It was not by gold or by silver, but by labour, that all the wealth of the world was originally purchased;

The greatest improvement in the productive powers of labour, and the greater part of the skill, dexterity, and judgment with which it is anywhere directed, or applied, seem to have been the effects of the division of labour.

When the landlord, annuitant, or monied man, has a greater revenue than what he judges sufficient to maintain his own family, he employs either the whole or a part of the surplus in maintaining one or more menial servants. Increase this surplus, and he will naturally increase the number of those servants.

Wages, profit, and rent, are the three original sources of all revenue, as well as of all exchangeable value. All other revenue is ultimately derived from someone or other of these.

It is not for its own sake that men desire money, but for the sake of what they can purchase with it.

todas las demás artes y manufacturas las consecuencias de la división del trabajo son semejantes a las que se dan en esta industria tan sencilla, aunque en muchas de ellas el trabajo no puede ser así subdividido, ni reducido a operaciones tan sencillas. De todas formas, la división del trabajo ocasiona en cada actividad, en la medida en que pueda ser introducida, un incremento proporcional en la capacidad productiva del trabajo.

When by an increase in the effectual demand, the market price of some particular commodity happens to rise a good deal above the natural price, those who employ their stocks in supplying that market are generally careful to conceal this change.

According, therefore, as this produce, or what is purchased with it, bears a greater or smaller proportion to the number of those who are to consume it, the nation will be better or worse supplied with all the necessaries and conveniencies for which it has occasion.

Where wages are not regulated by law, all that we can pretend to determine is, what are the most usual; and experience seems to shew that law can never regulate them properly, though it has often pretended to do so.

The man who employs either his labour or his stock in a grater variety of ways than his situation renders necessary, can never hurt his neighbour by underselling him. He may hurt himself, and he generally does so. Jack of all trades will never be rich, says the proverb. But the law ought always to trust people with the care of their own interest, as in their local situations they must generally be able to judge better of it than the legislator can do.

mercantilism

Rechaza específicamente las intervenciones particulares del Estado para fomentar tal o cual actividad, para proteger tal o cual sector en mayor beneficio de la comunidad. El argumento que emplea es profundamente práctico: el Estado no sabe cómo hacerlo.

wages of labour, the profits of stock, or the rent of land.

Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to, only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer.

that prevailed before his time. National wealth was measured in terms of a country's stock

Labour alone, therefore, never varying in its own value, is alone the ultimate and real standard by which the value of all commodities can at all times and places be estimated and compared. It is their real price; money is their nominal price only.

The great affair, we always find, is to get money.

To attempt to increase the wealth of any country, either by introducing or by detaining in it an unnecessary quantity of gold and silver, is as absurd as it would be to attempt to increase the good cheer of private families by obliging them to keep an unnecessary number of kitchen utensils.

necessaries