ABSTRACT
The attitude towards consumption among seventeenth and eighteenth century economists took a winding, complex path. Up to the 1680s they were hostile to a rise in consumption by the workers. They wanted to keep wages low, both to force the poor to work more and to control them socially. The attitude later changed, and mid eighteenth century authors were finally able to free themselves of the fear of goods inherited from the past. They went so far as to theorize growth based on the increase in consumption, which in its turn enabled productivity to increase. But this was only for a brief period. With the end of the Enlightenment and the beginning of the industrial revolution, the fear of goods returned. This came about in connection with a new development model, that of the classical school, which from this point of view was strikingly similar to the model of the early mercantilists. It was in fact based on the extension of unskilled labour and on keeping workers’ consumption down to the bare minimum.
