A candid confession first- I didn’t pay the 21 dollar 95 cents that it would have cost Average Joe to buy this book. I borrowed it from the MOD library, in South Block, the seat of power in New Delhi: Which incidentally conceals many precious tomes within its’ unappealing but cavernous interiors. It cost me nothing since the membership comes as perks of the job. Ordinarily I would have dropped this on reading the price tag in South Extension’s Midland bookshop. And it isn’t really the kind of book that is peddled by the book pirates in Bombay traffic signals. I recall buying Musharraff’s biography from the book pirates in Vile Parle, Mumbai on a principle that thou shall not pay royalty to thy enemy.
Why is the original wealth of Nations 892 ½ pages long? The reasons are not far to seek. Smith was an accomplished Public Speaker. The natural verbosity of dictation must have made the book long. Secondly, Smith had the tendency to qualify his statements to achieve the hue and tint he desired. The seeds of many ideas propounded therein could be traced back to the public speeches he made. Now you could have an entertaining capsule form of the book with hilarious examples to appreciate it better.
To understand the wealth of Nations better one ought to read the theory of moral sentiments, says O’Rourke. The Wealth is divided into five books. Book 1 on production and distribution, book 2 on profits, book 3 on economic history of Europe, book 4 is a refutation of economic ideas other than his own and book 5 is his attempt to apply his ideas to solve the problems of the Govt. I quote O’Rourke verbatim since I haven’t touched the original “Wealth…” or for that matter the “Origin of Species” which I understand is tough reading. I did attempt to read Cosmos by Carl Sagan and Stephen Hawking greatest unread classic “ A brief History of Time”. Found myself distracted too often. They occupy the pride of place in my bookshelf. Wealth of Nations wasn’t exactly prescribed reading for Economics Masters course in Kerala University in the eighties. Many of our Professors were overt communists and covert consumerists. Marxian dialectics was the in thing. Every thing was analyzed from the Marxist perspective…art, literature, cinema, Silk Smitha and Shakeela (couple of sexy sirens from South Indian moviedom). Adam Smith was old hat: an idea whose time has gone past its’ expiry date.
The pace of reading was leisurely in the 1700s and there wasn’t much on TV . ( I was strongly reminded of my growing up years in a village in Palakkad, Kerala, where the pace of life not very different from Smith’s time) Smith could at times sound like a precursor to Karl Marx when ascribed the original value of things to labour much before Marx did. At times he could sound like the father of Neocons and other times like a news anchor on Fox TV. “ The oppression of the poor must establish the monopoly of the rich”, he said. He was no moralist nor did he go into the original reasons for disparity of wealth. The reasons for this unapologetic worldview are contained in “The theory of Moral sentiments”. He held that the rich consume more than the poor and the sole end along with vain gratification of their desires is division with poor of all the improvements. I have tried to use one fourth of the original construct of Adam Smith just to prove that he indeed saw the offshoot of creation of wealth; the improvement of poor. At the same time there was a kind of finality and inevitability behind disparity in that “They are led by an invisible hand to make nearly the same distribution of the necessaries of life, which would have been made, had the earth been divided into equal portions among all its’ inhabitants.” So, eat your heart out, all ye dispossessed, don’t sit on dharnas before Jantar Mantar. You deserve it… you had it coming…Let a thousand Narmadas drown you and your holdings beneath the deluge.
Every time the white Caucasian holds forth on the concept of software piracy, intellectual property rights, I am tempted to ask…. What about …ahem …. Property rights? Didn’t marauding red faces bearing a strong resemblance to you usurp the land of Indians in the Wild West? Didn’t the East India Company attach large swathes of land under a dubious construct of Lapse?. But lest we forget, behind every great fortune, there is great crime. This applies to fortunes of nations too. Software piracy by China and India are early steps towards great fortunes. I digress. We are talking about the seminal and soul defining work of capitalism, An enquiry into the wealth of Nations. It would be unfair to P J O’Rourke to call this book a spoof. It is as erudite but not bone tickling as one would wish the “Das Capital” were. Written in a time when the lingo of scholarly works in economics hadn’t acquired gravitas that they possess today, the Wealth of Nations is not just an apologist’s version of capitalism. Morality, Philosophy and Economics had found many common intertwining elements before Amartya Sen gave it a jargon of its’ own.
Considering that in the real world one would try to maximize self-interest, Adam Smith based it as the cornerstone of his work. He accidentally or otherwise digressed into many areas outside his element. O’Rourke has real world examples which are side splitting. O’Rourke says rather modestly that his job is to make quips and jests and somewhere in Mumbai, there is a younger, funnier person who is willing to work for less. Maybe my favourite blogger Sidin Vadukut can do a better job.(Read Whatay.com and you will know what I mean). But O’Rourke’s comparisons with today’s America are truly cheering.
Adam Smith criticized Mercantilism for the inherent contradictions it contained. China, the neo mercantilist version of today must meet its’ nemesis if Smith were to be believed. Smith provided the basis for paper money when much of the world thought it would make money free. Smith would certainly be turning in his grave when he knows of the extents to which money out of nothing could be made by innovative financial products and derivatives trading. Smith spoke of less Government and considered the labour of Govt as unproductive. What I all along suspected as a Govt Official is yelled out by Smith centuries ago.
Book 3 examines the institutions and deals with the moral basis of capitalism. “To improve land with profit requires an exact attention to small savings and small gains, of which a man born to a great fortune is very seldom capable” wrote Smith. Stories of first generation entrepreneurs in India and the down fall of great families which fought over division of wealth and then went on to blow it all on blondes and holidays in Nice prove it. Every time I see a snooty nosed customer throwing tantrums in a five star hotel, I am tempted to remind him that the waiter can always spit into his food and have him unsuspectingly consume it. Every time I see an overpaid marketing executive, I recollect the number of sugared water in branded bottles and packaged chip I have consumed that go into sustaining his uppity lifestyle. No pangs of social conscience for Adam Smith. At times he can turn post modernist and Marxist at the same time (minus the incomprehensible jargon).
Chapter 13 “ An inquiry into Adam Smith” is the funniest. Smith never married. Spent his leisure time teaching his nephew. He resigned his professorship to tutor the young Duke of Buccleuch and tried to return the students’ fees since he had to leave midterm. Students liked him so much that none would accept a refund. He was splendidly absentminded, says O’Rourke. Given to wandering fifteen miles from home in robe and slippers. I wish I could quote the entire chapter. But the thought of being hauled up for copyright violation and the discomforts of fighting legal battles/ spending jail terms at middle age restrains me from doing so.
Read it… You will love it.
Why is the original wealth of Nations 892 ½ pages long? The reasons are not far to seek. Smith was an accomplished Public Speaker. The natural verbosity of dictation must have made the book long. Secondly, Smith had the tendency to qualify his statements to achieve the hue and tint he desired. The seeds of many ideas propounded therein could be traced back to the public speeches he made. Now you could have an entertaining capsule form of the book with hilarious examples to appreciate it better.
To understand the wealth of Nations better one ought to read the theory of moral sentiments, says O’Rourke. The Wealth is divided into five books. Book 1 on production and distribution, book 2 on profits, book 3 on economic history of Europe, book 4 is a refutation of economic ideas other than his own and book 5 is his attempt to apply his ideas to solve the problems of the Govt. I quote O’Rourke verbatim since I haven’t touched the original “Wealth…” or for that matter the “Origin of Species” which I understand is tough reading. I did attempt to read Cosmos by Carl Sagan and Stephen Hawking greatest unread classic “ A brief History of Time”. Found myself distracted too often. They occupy the pride of place in my bookshelf. Wealth of Nations wasn’t exactly prescribed reading for Economics Masters course in Kerala University in the eighties. Many of our Professors were overt communists and covert consumerists. Marxian dialectics was the in thing. Every thing was analyzed from the Marxist perspective…art, literature, cinema, Silk Smitha and Shakeela (couple of sexy sirens from South Indian moviedom). Adam Smith was old hat: an idea whose time has gone past its’ expiry date.
The pace of reading was leisurely in the 1700s and there wasn’t much on TV . ( I was strongly reminded of my growing up years in a village in Palakkad, Kerala, where the pace of life not very different from Smith’s time) Smith could at times sound like a precursor to Karl Marx when ascribed the original value of things to labour much before Marx did. At times he could sound like the father of Neocons and other times like a news anchor on Fox TV. “ The oppression of the poor must establish the monopoly of the rich”, he said. He was no moralist nor did he go into the original reasons for disparity of wealth. The reasons for this unapologetic worldview are contained in “The theory of Moral sentiments”. He held that the rich consume more than the poor and the sole end along with vain gratification of their desires is division with poor of all the improvements. I have tried to use one fourth of the original construct of Adam Smith just to prove that he indeed saw the offshoot of creation of wealth; the improvement of poor. At the same time there was a kind of finality and inevitability behind disparity in that “They are led by an invisible hand to make nearly the same distribution of the necessaries of life, which would have been made, had the earth been divided into equal portions among all its’ inhabitants.” So, eat your heart out, all ye dispossessed, don’t sit on dharnas before Jantar Mantar. You deserve it… you had it coming…Let a thousand Narmadas drown you and your holdings beneath the deluge.
Every time the white Caucasian holds forth on the concept of software piracy, intellectual property rights, I am tempted to ask…. What about …ahem …. Property rights? Didn’t marauding red faces bearing a strong resemblance to you usurp the land of Indians in the Wild West? Didn’t the East India Company attach large swathes of land under a dubious construct of Lapse?. But lest we forget, behind every great fortune, there is great crime. This applies to fortunes of nations too. Software piracy by China and India are early steps towards great fortunes. I digress. We are talking about the seminal and soul defining work of capitalism, An enquiry into the wealth of Nations. It would be unfair to P J O’Rourke to call this book a spoof. It is as erudite but not bone tickling as one would wish the “Das Capital” were. Written in a time when the lingo of scholarly works in economics hadn’t acquired gravitas that they possess today, the Wealth of Nations is not just an apologist’s version of capitalism. Morality, Philosophy and Economics had found many common intertwining elements before Amartya Sen gave it a jargon of its’ own.
Considering that in the real world one would try to maximize self-interest, Adam Smith based it as the cornerstone of his work. He accidentally or otherwise digressed into many areas outside his element. O’Rourke has real world examples which are side splitting. O’Rourke says rather modestly that his job is to make quips and jests and somewhere in Mumbai, there is a younger, funnier person who is willing to work for less. Maybe my favourite blogger Sidin Vadukut can do a better job.(Read Whatay.com and you will know what I mean). But O’Rourke’s comparisons with today’s America are truly cheering.
Adam Smith criticized Mercantilism for the inherent contradictions it contained. China, the neo mercantilist version of today must meet its’ nemesis if Smith were to be believed. Smith provided the basis for paper money when much of the world thought it would make money free. Smith would certainly be turning in his grave when he knows of the extents to which money out of nothing could be made by innovative financial products and derivatives trading. Smith spoke of less Government and considered the labour of Govt as unproductive. What I all along suspected as a Govt Official is yelled out by Smith centuries ago.
Book 3 examines the institutions and deals with the moral basis of capitalism. “To improve land with profit requires an exact attention to small savings and small gains, of which a man born to a great fortune is very seldom capable” wrote Smith. Stories of first generation entrepreneurs in India and the down fall of great families which fought over division of wealth and then went on to blow it all on blondes and holidays in Nice prove it. Every time I see a snooty nosed customer throwing tantrums in a five star hotel, I am tempted to remind him that the waiter can always spit into his food and have him unsuspectingly consume it. Every time I see an overpaid marketing executive, I recollect the number of sugared water in branded bottles and packaged chip I have consumed that go into sustaining his uppity lifestyle. No pangs of social conscience for Adam Smith. At times he can turn post modernist and Marxist at the same time (minus the incomprehensible jargon).
Chapter 13 “ An inquiry into Adam Smith” is the funniest. Smith never married. Spent his leisure time teaching his nephew. He resigned his professorship to tutor the young Duke of Buccleuch and tried to return the students’ fees since he had to leave midterm. Students liked him so much that none would accept a refund. He was splendidly absentminded, says O’Rourke. Given to wandering fifteen miles from home in robe and slippers. I wish I could quote the entire chapter. But the thought of being hauled up for copyright violation and the discomforts of fighting legal battles/ spending jail terms at middle age restrains me from doing so.
Read it… You will love it.
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