Identity Quote by Roger Scruton

Adam Smith had one overwhelmingly important triumph: he put into the center of economics the systematic analysis of the behavior of individuals pursuing their…

— George Stigler

The key insight of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations is misleadingly simple: if an exchange between two parties is voluntary, it will not take…

— Milton Friedman

Adam Smith saw the greed of modern capitalism for what it was - a form of destructive ambition that may have favorable effects on…

— Allen W. Wood

“When a nation was faced with a choice between abstract principle or complete self-interest, it took self-interest every time.”

— Jack L. Chalker

“As Adam Smith argued more than two centuries ago, when individuals freely pursue their own self-interests—presumably, even their most trivial desires—the aggregate effect is…

— Paul Roberts

“Needless to say, this idea that the origin of prosperity is hard work and frugality was exhaustively formulated by Adam Smith in The Wealth…

— Axel Kaiser

“Smith argued that it was possible for all nations to increase their wealth by adopting policies that promote specialization and the division of labor.”

— Edd S. Noell

During the two centuries since the publication of 'The Wealth of Nations,' the main activity of economists, it seems to me, has been to…

— Ronald Coase

The dynamo of our economic system is self-interest which may range from mere petty greed to admirable types of self-expression.

— Felix Frankfurter

But Adam Smith was a philosopher as well as well as an economist, famous in his time as much for his Theory of Moral…

— Paul Ormerod

“Is it really true that political self-interest is nobler somehow than economic self-interest? . . . And just tell me where in the world…

— Milton Friedman