Blog #8

1. How would you defend Smith’s views as expressed in this essay? In what sense is he right in establishing

the “natural progress of opulence” as you observe it yourself? He describes the world

as he knows it in his own time and then imagines how it might have become that way. How well does he satisfy your curiosity about the way in which nations grow rich?

Adams Smith thought natural progress of opulence is that agriculture should be first, then manufacturing, and lastly foreign commerce. He only talks about how the country development should come before the town development which would help both. 

2. Smith places a great deal of faith in the value of land for maintaining wealth. Since most people

today, including wealthy people, do not necessarily see their wealth in terms of land, what in our

time might substitute for land? What would a wealthy person interpret as a secure or conservative

capital investment?

We say a wealthy person now would invest in stocks now instead of land. They would only invest in secure stocks though that they know would not have a very high chance of losing money and a good chance of gaining money. 

3. Argue in favor of or in opposition to Smith’s statement in paragraph 8: “According to the natural

course of things, therefore, the greater part of the capital of every growing society is, first, directed

to agriculture, afterwards to manufactures, and last of all to foreign commerce.” Because in

the early 2000s the United States is in the midst of a “new economy,” this statement will need

to be examined closely and augmented. How would you continue the “evolution” that Smith

observed?

As a group we don't agree with Adam Smith's statement about how agriculture comes first, then manufacturing, and lastly foreign commerce. We think agriculture is last now.