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This is one of those cases in which the imagination is baffled by the facts.

Adam Smith

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Adam Smith
Age: 67 †
Born: 1723
Born: June 16
Died: 1790
Died: July 17
Economist
Non-Fiction Writer
Philosopher
University Teacher
Writer
Lang Toun
Economy
Imagination
Facts
Baffled
Economics
Ignorance
Cases

More quotes by Adam Smith

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Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform combination, not to raise the wages of labor.
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Beneficence is always free, it cannot be extorted by force.
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Man naturally desires, not only to be loved, but to be lovely or to be that thing which is the natural and proper object of love.
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The tolls for the maintenance of a high road, cannot with any safety be made the property of private persons.
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In public, as well as in private expences, great wealth may, perhaps, frequently be admitted as an apology for great folly.
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Great nations are never impoverished by private, though they sometimes are by public prodigality and misconduct.
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We are delighted to find a person who values us as we value ourselves, and distinguishes us from the rest of mankind, with an attention not unlike that with which we distinguish ourselves.
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The cheapness of wine seems to be a cause, not of drunkenness, but of sobriety. ...People are seldom guilty of excess in what is their daily fare... On the contrary, in the countries which, either from excessive heat or cold, produce no grapes, and where wine consequently is dear and a rarity, drunkenness is a common vice.
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The rate of profit... is naturally low in rich and high in poor countries, and it is always highest in the countries which are going fastest to ruin.
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A man must always live by his work, and his wages must at least be sufficient to maintain him. They must even upon most occasions be somewhat more otherwise it would be impossible for him to bring up a family, and the race of such workmen could not last beyond the first generation.
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The mob, when they are gazing at a dancer on the slack rope, naturally writhe and twist and balance their own bodies, as they see him do.
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I have no faith in political arithmetic.
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An instructed and intelligent people are always more decent and orderly than an ignorant and stupid one.
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The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities.
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I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good.
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Thus the labour of a manufacture adds, generally, to the value of the materials which he works upon, that of his own maintenance, and of his masters profits. The labour of a menial servant, on the contrary, adds to the value of nothing.
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A true party-man hates and despises candour.
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The natural effort of every individual to better his own condition is so powerful that it is alone, and without any assistance, capable not only of carrying on the society to wealth and prosperity, but of surmounting 100 impertinent obstructions with which the folly of human laws too often encumbers its operations.
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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.
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It is unjust that the whole of society should contribute towards an expence of which the benefit is confined to a part of the society.
Adam Smith