But Smith didn’t believe greed for wealth was the ultimate driver of economies. He thought something else was going on, something deeper in the human psyche. ‘Humanity does not desire to be great, but to be beloved,’ he wrote in 1759. ‘The rich man glories in his riches because he feels they naturally draw upon him the attention of the world … and he is fonder of his wealth on this account than for all the other advantages it procures him.’
