Smith took the view that people were ultimately selfish creatures. He believed that man “intends only his own gain.” But he also believed that when people acted in their own self-interest somehow everybody benefited, as if they were guided in their actions by “an invisible hand” to promote the interests of society more effectively than “man” could, even if he had intended to. Smith’s points of reference for this were the market towns of eighteenth-century Europe, where the traders, manufacturers, and merchants all worked to make their own personal fortunes, but where collectively their effort
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