The Wealth of Nations: Adam Smith

Adam Smith's first title page

An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations is the magnum opus of the Scottish economistAdam Smith, published on March 9, 1776, during theScottish Enlightenment. It is a clearly written account ofpolitical economy at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, and is widely considered to be the first modern work in the field of economics. The work is also the first comprehensive defense of free market policies. It is broken down into five books between two volumes. The Wealth of Nations was written for the average educated individual of the 18th centuryrather than for specialists and mathematicians.
There are three main concepts that Adam Smith expands upon in this work that forms the foundation of free market economics: division of labour, pursuit of self interest, and freedom of trade.

Themes

The invisible hand

There are two important features of Smith's concept of the "invisible hand". First, Smith was not advocating a social policy (that people should act in their own self interest), but rather was describing an observed economic reality (that people do act in their own interest). Second, Smith was not claiming that all self-interest has beneficial effects on the community. He did not argue that self-interest is always good; he merely argued against the view that self-interest is necessarily bad. It is worth noting that, upon his death, Smith left much of his personal wealth to charity./.../