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Adam Smith Quotes

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Adam Smith: Scottish economist and author of The Wealth of Nations, 1723 to 1790.

People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.

Adam Smith · An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, I, I, 10, pt. 2

There is no art which one government sooner learns of another than that of draining money from the pockets of the people.

Adam Smith

Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer.

Adam Smith · An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, II, IV, 8

It is the highest impertinence and presumption, therefore, in kings and ministers to pretend to watch over the economy of private people, and to restrain their expense.… They are themselves always, and without any exception, the greatest spendthrifts in the society.

Adam Smith · An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, I, II, 3

It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love.

Adam Smith · An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776), vol. I, bk. I, ch. 2

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.

Adam Smith · An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, II, IV, 7, pt. 3

With the greater part of rich people, the chief enjoyment of riches consists in the parade of riches.

Adam Smith · The source reads: “With the greater part of rich people, the chief enjoyment of riches consists in the parade of riches, which in their eyes is never so complete as when they appear to possess those decisive marks of opulence which nobody can possess but themselves.” · An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, I, I, 11, pt. 2

The discovery of America, and that of a passage to the East Indies by the Cape of Good Hope, are the two greatest and most important events recorded in the history of mankind.

Adam Smith · An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, II, IV, 7, pt. 3

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