Economic Thought before Adam Smith

Abstract

This volume is the most extensive treatment from a modern Austrian perspective ot he history of economic thought up to Adam Smith and, as such, takes into account the profound influences of religious, social, and political thought upon economics. The author traces economic ideas from ancient sources and shows that laissez-faire liberalism and economic thought itself began with the scholastics and early Roman and canon law. The scholastics, he argues, established and developed the subjective utility and scarcity theory of value, as well as the theory that prices, or the value of money, depend on its supply and demand. The Continental, or - pre-Austrian - tradition, was destroyed, rather than developed, by Adam Smith whose strong Calvinist tendencies toward glorifying labor, toil, and thrift is contrasted with emphasis in scholastic economic thought towards labor in the service of consumption. Tracing economic thought from the Greeks to the Scottish enlightment, this book in notable for its inclusion of all the important figures in each school of thought with their theories assessed in historical context.