Regrading the famous quote by economist Adam Smith:
"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, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages."
"The bizarre thing here is that, at the time Smith was writing, this simply wasn't true. Most English shopkeepers were still carrying out the main part of their business on credit, which meant that customers appealed to their benevolence all the time. Smith could hardly have been unaware of this. Rather, he is drawing a utopian picture."
- David Graeber, Debt, the first 5,000 years, p335
Comment: the odd and somewhat annoying thing for a Scot is that Graeber here says 'English shopkeepers' even though Smith was Scottish and writing after 1707, referring the Great Britain as a whole, not just England. Still, the main point is valid, and very important since it undercuts one of the key myths of capitalism.
"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, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages."
"The bizarre thing here is that, at the time Smith was writing, this simply wasn't true. Most English shopkeepers were still carrying out the main part of their business on credit, which meant that customers appealed to their benevolence all the time. Smith could hardly have been unaware of this. Rather, he is drawing a utopian picture."
- David Graeber, Debt, the first 5,000 years, p335
Comment: the odd and somewhat annoying thing for a Scot is that Graeber here says 'English shopkeepers' even though Smith was Scottish and writing after 1707, referring the Great Britain as a whole, not just England. Still, the main point is valid, and very important since it undercuts one of the key myths of capitalism.