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  • Adam Smith Quotes   204
  • We rarely hear, it has been said, of the combinations [that is, unions or colluding organizations] of masters, though frequently of those of workmen. But whoever imagines, upon this account, that masters rarely combine, is as ignorant of the world as of the subject. Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform combination, not to raise the wages of labor above their actual price.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Adam Smith Quotes , Organization Quotes , Ignorant Quotes
  • Wherever there is great property there is great inequality. For one very rich man there must be at least five hundred poor, and the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of the many. The affluence of the rich excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy, to invade his possessions.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Adam Smith Quotes , Men Quotes , Envy Quotes
  • In this consists the difference between the character of a miser and that of a person of exact economy and assiduity. The one is anxious about small matters for their own sake; the other attends to them only in consequence of the scheme of life which he has laid down to himself.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Adam Smith Quotes , Character Quotes , Differences Quotes
  • Every individual is continually exerting himself to find out the most advantageous employment for whatever capital he can command. It is his own advantage, indeed, and not that of the society which he has in view. But the study of his own advantage naturally, or rather necessarily, leads him to prefer that employment which is most advantageous to society... He intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was not part of his intention
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Adam Smith Quotes , Views Quotes , Hands Quotes
  • It is not by augmenting the capital of the country, but by rendering a greater part of that capital active and productive than would otherwise be so, that the most judicious operations of banking can increase the industry of the country.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Adam Smith Quotes , Country Quotes , Banking Quotes
  • To found a great empire for the sole purpose of raising up a people of customers, may at first sight appear a project fit only for a nation of shopkeepers. It is, however, a project altogether unfit for a nation of shopkeepers; but extremely fit for a nation whose government is influenced by shopkeepers.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Adam Smith Quotes , Government Quotes , Sight Quotes
  • The annual produce of the land and labour of any nation can be increased in its value by no other means, but by increasing either the number of its productive labourers, or the productive powers of those labourers who had before been employed.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Adam Smith Quotes , Mean Quotes , Land Quotes
  • It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from 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. Nobody but a beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his fellow citizens.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Adam Smith Quotes , Self Quotes , Humanity Quotes
  • The annual labour of every nation is the fund which originally supplies it with all the necessaries and conveniencies of life which it annually consumes, and which consist always either in the immediate produce of that labour, or in what is purchased with that produce from other nations.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Adam Smith Quotes , Origin Of Life Quotes , Produce Quotes