ABSTRACT
A professor of moral philosophy at the University of Glasgow, Adam Smith wrote the first comprehensive account of the operation of the new market economy. His work displayed a system of thought that formulated general principles and identified a means to predict and understand collective human behavior. Smith’s interpretation identifies the functioning of a constant, universal human nature operating at the level of the individual and links it to a larger aggregate effect. As Smith commented, it was not through the benevolence of the butcher and the baker that we got our good, cheap meat and bread, but rather through their own self-interested drive to secure as much trade for themselves as possible. In an equally indirect manner, Smith saw that it was the accumulation of savings that enabled ambitious manufacturers to reap the advantages of the division of labor.
