The Evolution of Economics as a Science

The Evolution of Economics as a Science

Introduction

A definition that captures much of modern economics is that of Lionel Robbins in a 1932 essay: the science which studies human behavior as a relationship between ends and scarce means which have alternative uses. Scarcity means that available resources are insufficient to satisfy all wants and needs. Absent scarcity and alternative uses of available resources, there is no economic problem. The subject thus defined involves the study of choices as they are affected by incentives and resources.

Adam Smith

Adam Smith was the founder of economics, as we know it today. His thoughts have shaped modern ideas about the market economy and the role of the state in relation to it. Smith laid the intellectual framework that explained the free market (which still holds true today) and laissez-faire. Both are connected with the underlying theme of economic growth. Smith's analysis is not confined to showing the interrelation between the different elements of a continually maintained system. It also explains how the system can generate the continual accumulation of wealth (McGuire 2003). And since, according to Smith, this process is most successful when left to the play of natural forces; his analysis leads him to urge governments to let well alone.

He is most often recognized for the expression "the invisible hand," which he used to demonstrate how self-interest guides the most efficient use of resources in a nation's economy, with public welfare coming as a by-product. It simply encourages businesses to provide what consumers want and at the same time it discourages government involvement. He believed that the only responsibilities of the government should be to define property rights, set up honest courts, imposes minor taxes and subsides to compensate for well defined and narrowly specified “market failures” (Geracimos 2001). To underscore his laissez-faire convictions, Smith argued that state and personal efforts, to promote social good are ineffectual compared to unbridled market forces.

Adam Smith explained that a monopoly charges any price that it chooses, robs consumers and makes countries less efficient and poorer. Competition, he said, means that businesses try to charge the lowest price possible, so consumers get maximum value for money. If they can buy more, they support more jobs in the economy and the country grows richer. Without the police stopping competition, he said, monopolies cannot survive for long. Around the world today, government monopolies and other bad practices are under major assault from Adam Smith's ideas.

He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention (Rossi ...