"This disposition to admire, and almost to worship, the rich and the powerful, and to despise, or, at least, to neglect persons of poor and mean condition, though necessary both to establish and to maintain the distinction of ranks and the order of society, is, at the same time, the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments. That wealth and greatness are often regarded with the respect and admiration which are due only to wisdom and virtue; and that the contempt, of which vice and folly are the only proper objects, is often most unjustly bestowed upon poverty and weakness, has been the complaint of moralists in all ages" The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Part I, Chap. 3, sec. 28.
"We rarely hear, it has been said, of the combinations of masters, though frequently of those of workmen. But whoever imagines, upon this account, that masters rarely combine, is as ignorant of the world as of the subject. Masters are always and every where in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform combination, not to raise the wages of labour above their actual rate. To violate this combination is every where a most unpopular action, and a sort of reproach to a master among his neighbours and equals. We seldom, indeed, hear of this combination, because it is the usual, and one may say, the natural state of things which nobody ever hears of." An Inquiry, etc., Part 1, Chap. 8, Sec. 13.
And many more.
On Tue, Aug 17, 2010 at 7:57 AM, Andy <andy274 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 17, 2010 at 10:40 AM, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
> > I quoted Adam Smith from memory on the relationship between profitability
> and decadence, and someone sent me the full quote offlist. It's a good one:
> >
> >> "The plans and projects of the employers of stock regulate and direct
> all the most important operations of labour, and profit is the end proposed
> by all those plans and projects. But the rate of profit does not, like rent
> and wages, rise with the prosperity, and fall with the declension of the
> society. On the contrary, it is naturally low in rich, and high in poor
> countries, and it is always highest in the countries which are going fastest
> to ruin."
>
> He throws a lot of inadvertent time-traveling grenades at his modern
> fans, doesn't he?
>
>
> --
> Andy
>
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>