Adam Smith Quotes
The real and effectual discipline which is exercised over a workman is that of his customers. It is the fear of losing their employment which restrains his frauds and corrects his negligence.
Smith, Adam. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. W. Strahan and T. Cadell, 1776.
This is one of the earliest examples of regulation for consumer protection. Later, the Magna Carta would incorporate the concept of standard weights and measures.
At the time of this interview there had been a decade of business fraud at many different levels. The regulatory agencies supposedly responsible for the regulation had neither the staff or the political will to even enforce the laws and regulations then in existence and there were many loopholes in those. Many business interests opposed all regulation and strict enforcement as a diminution of the health of the economy. Others, like Greenspan, saw fraud as corrupting the markets themselves and therefore the usual capitalistic economic competitive forces that would control business do not operate with extensive fraud.
Adam Smith FRSA was a Scottish economist, philosopher as well as a moral philosopher, a pioneer of political economy, and a key figure during the Scottish Enlightenment, also known as ''The Father of Economics'' or ''The Father of Capitalism''. Smith wrote two classic works, The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759) and An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776). The latter, often abbreviated as The Wealth of Nations, is considered his magnum opus and the first modern work of economics. In his work, Adam Smith introduced his theory of absolute advantage.
