The Worldly Philosophers
Chapter 14
- The Worldly Philosophers Description of publication
- The Worldly Philosophers TOC
- The Worldly Philosophers Sample page
- An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations Recommended supplement
From this chapter:
My dog is worried about the economy because Alpo is up to 99 cents a can. That's about $7.00 in dog money.
Joe Weinstein
Robert L. Heilbroner, the author of The Worldly Philosophers, is a wonderful writer, and he would enjoy Weinstein's comments about economics. This book is one of Heilbroner's classics, appearing now in its sixth edition. Adam Smith was no slouch in his day either when he wrote The Wealth of Nations (see "Recommended Supplement" below). Although the two books are fundamentally different-Heilbroner's being an overview of the lives of the economists whose ideas set in motion the development of the Western world, and Smith's the voluminous investigation of the nature of what was to become capitalism-they both help to explain the paradigms that created the intellectual foundation of our economy.
Unlike communism and socialism, American capitalism had no ideology specifically adopted by the political process, except that government should stay out of its way. Nevertheless, capitalism is the strongest political-economic force on the planet. The two books in this chapter offer a representative perspective on capitalism and the evolution of economic thinking.