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View Full Version : Wealth of Nations, a good book?


Nikolay
1st May 2011, 00:58
Would anyone recommend reading the Wealth of Nations? I am interested in buying the book (or books?), but I just want to check with you guys so I don't waste my money (don't tell me to read it on the internet, I always feel more comfortable reading a book). ;P
Hoipolloi Cassidy
1st May 2011, 01:06
Would anyone recommend reading the Wealth of Nations? I am interested in buying the book (or books?), but I just want to check with you guys so I don't waste my money (don't tell me to read it on the internet, I always feel more comfortable reading a book). ;P

Sure. It's well written, which comes easy since the arguments are simplistic. Plus, it's interesting to ferret out the contradictions, first among them that - guess what? - Smith isn't really a free-marketer anyhow.

If you're going to buy it, though, don't buy the Regnery Press version, it's an extreme right-wing organization, and known for screwing over its contributors as well...
bailey_187
1st May 2011, 01:13
i found it boring, worth having it for reference tho i guess
Os Cangaceiros
1st May 2011, 01:34
I own the Bantam Classics edition. I don't even know why I got it, actually. But it is an incredible influential book, and important to the history of the left, so I suppose that was the reason. Anyway. I haven't read past the first couple chapters. It's a really long book.
Dumb
1st May 2011, 01:53
It's a good book to study. If you just want to know the basics of what Smith argues, though, you can easily get away with reading Richard Heilbroner's chapter on Smith in The Worldly Philosophers. It was fascinating to see that Smith actually thought capitalism was doomed to stagnate eventually.
Nikolay
1st May 2011, 02:15
Sure. It's well written, which comes easy since the arguments are simplistic. Plus, it's interesting to ferret out the contradictions, first among them that - guess what? - Smith isn't really a free-marketer anyhow.

If you're going to buy it, though, don't buy the Regnery Press version, it's an extreme right-wing organization, and known for screwing over its contributors as well...

I might buy the Penguin Classics version on amazon.ca.
RED DAVE
1st May 2011, 02:53
If you don't want to spend the money:

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3300

RED DAVE