Tag: Gavin Kennedy
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One Person’s Exploitation is Another Person’s Blessing
Writing in his recent post The Alleged "Perils" of "Premature De-Industrialisation." Economist Gavin Kennedy writes: "… I also recall more recently of a Vietnamese woman on being questioned by a Western journalist about her 14-hour working day that she worked six days a week in a new computer-board manufacturing plant near her home village. The…
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Note to Progressives: How Not to Critique Adam Smith
Gavin Kennedy at Adam Smith's Lost Legacy has another excellent post on misconceptions about Adam Smith: Five Errors About Adam Smith and Classical Political Economy. He quotes an article in the Grand Island Independent by Lee Elliott and then shows five errors the author makes based on widely circulated myths. I don't know the author's…
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Need for Historical Perspective on Poverty
One of my favorite niche economics blogs is Gavin Kennedy's Adam Smith's Lost Legacy. Many of his posts go after people using Adam Smith's "invisible hand" metaphor. He tirelessly points out that Smith used the metaphor only twice in The Wealth of Nations, and on neither occasion was it used to describe the economics in…
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Adam Smith’s Authentic Views On Church and State
One of my favorite blogs is Adam Smith's Lost Legacy, written by economic historian Gavin Kennedy. He frequently finds mentions of Adam Smith's "invisible hand" from around the web and then debunks the abuse of Smith's views. The metaphor mentioned only twice in passing in The Wealth of Nations, was appropriated by economists over the…
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The Nearly Invisible “Invisible Hand” in Adam Smith’s Work
Economic Historian Gavin Kennedy responds to a question from one of his readers about Adam Smith's use of the invisible hand metaphor. Smith used the metaphor once in "The Wealth of Nations" and once in "Theory of Moral Sentiments" (and also once in his "History of Astronomy.") On neither occasion was it used to refer…
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On Adam Smith’s Alleged theism
Adam Smith's Lost Legacy (Gavin Kennedy): On Adam Smith’s Alleged theism I am working hard on my chapter for the forthcoming Handbook on Adam Smith (Oxford University Press), edited by Chris Berry of Glasgow University. Among my notes of scholars who take an entirely different view to mine (roughly that Adam Smith deliberately hid his…
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Exchange and Trade in the Pre-Capitalist World
One of Adam Smith's more famous observations is on the propensity of human beings to "truck, barter, and exchange." But have they always? Some scholars would argue that the claim is overstated. In response, some scholars, while affirming that economic activity in past societies was not identical to our modern commercial societies, say critics are…
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Questioning the Myth of the Invisible Hand
Adam Smith's Lost Legacy: Questioning the Myth of the Invisible Hand (Gavin Kennedy) Dave Cohen writes (27 March) for Decline of the Empire HERE “Invisible Hand Goes Missing” “For most of the last 3 decades, many influential economists embraced a theory that justified wholesale theft by the Finance industry because the magical powers of Adam…
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Origins of the Myths of the Invisible Hand
Adam Smith's Lost Legacy: Origins of the Myths of the Invisible Hand I was looking for a reference in a book in my library and came across, at the back, as you do, my rather battered copy of Paul Samuelson’s popular textbook, ‘Economics’ (which I had looked unsuccessfully for many years). In the 1960s, later…