David Hume thought that a taste for luxury was desirable, because it promoted economic and political development (it brought down feudalism, among other things). Adam Smith's early works follow a very similar line though, unlike Hume, he saw a taste for luxury as rather contemptible despite its desirable effects. In the Wealth of Nations, however, saving is the key to growth, suggesting that spending on luxury harms growth, but Smith wanted to hang on to the arguments he had taken from Hume. This may explain a number of oddities and inconsistencies in the Wealth of Nations.
Despite their differences on other questions, Hume and Steuart had almost identical theories of long-run economic development. In their story, agriculture can produce a surplus of food to support urban manufacturing (and other things), but will not do so unless farmers want to trade the surplus for something. In the early stages of development, the absence of attractive manufactured goods gives no incentive to farmers. Once a taste for 'luxury' emerges, normally stimulated by imports from elsewhere, agriculture and industry expand together. Developments is driven by changing tastes combined with a changing menu of goods on offer.Hume, Steuart, development, luxury, surplus, agriculture,
The invisible hand as it appears in the Theory of Moral Sentiments is commonly treated as an afterthought in discussions of the version in the Wealth of Nations, but it deserves attention in its own right. I will argue that there is an entirely coherent (if not entirely plausible) economic argument underpinning the invisible hand of the Theory of Moral Sentiments. It is quite different from the invisible hand argument of the Wealth of Nations, not because of any conflict but because they address different questions. The argument in the Theory of Moral Sentiments allowed Smith to maintain an ironic distance from the inequality and greed that he saw around him while arguing that it did no harm, and allowed him to resolve, at least to his own satisfaction, an age-old debate about the ethical and political consequences of luxury consumption. Some of these themes were further developed in the Wealth of Nations, but without the phrase 'invisible hand', which was switched to a different part of the argument.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.