Monday, March 24, 2008

Another Case of Invisible Hand Confusion

In a muddled melanage of authors quoting others I find in The American Strategist (here) that a
Patrick Doherty (here): quotes Steve Clemons quoting: William Pfaff (20 March) here:

'‘Adam Smith was the author of the theory of the invisible hand that guides unregulated markets to produce the optimum result, but he took for granted that the hand was clean.’

Comment
Nowhere in any of his books and writings did Adam Smith assert such a theory of a role for a disembodied body part.

The invisible hand is a metaphor for how individual merchants cope with their risk avoidance when choosing whether to trade locally or to trade abroad.

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