As I have stated more than once, Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to Thomas Law in 1814, stated my own beliefs on the subject of self-interest in a single paragraph:
"Self-interest, or rather self-love, or egoism, has been more plausibly substituted as the basis of morality. But I consider our relations with others as constituting the boundaries of morality. With ourselves, we stand on the ground of identity, not of relation, which last, requiring two subjects, excludes self-love confined to a single one. To ourselves, in strict language, we can owe no duties, obligation requiring also two parties. Self-love, therefore, is no part of morality. Indeed, it is exactly its counterpart. " (The Complete Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Memorial Edition; Volume 14, page 140; 1904.)
I believe that much of the blame for this emphasis on self-interest in the world of economics can be laid at the feet of a misstatement by Adam Smith. I'll quote here from my OpEdNews article "Street Fighting Man--A Rock and Roll Epistle."
"It is self-evident that it is in the best interest of the laissez-faire capitalist to do anything they can--including eliminating the competition--to increase their business's profitability. To quote Kenneth Lux, ' The saving grace was supposed to be the 'invisible hand' of competition"[C]ompetition would keep these instincts [to drive competitors out of business] and 'expensive vanities'...in line. Smith would hardly have been surprised at the motives of Rockefeller, but"would have been chagrined at his success. Smith"overlooked the possi bility that self-interest would work to undermine and eliminate competition and"tie up the invisible hand. It is"unrestrained self-interest that is the fundamental flaw in any absolute policy of laissez-faire.' (Adam Smith's Mistake: How a Moral Philosopher Invented Economics and Ended Morality; 1990, pp. 118-9.)"
Adam Smith made his most famous statement, and in my opinion most troublesome error, in his book The Wealth of Nations (Book I, chapter 2, p. 23), when he wrote the following:
"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own self interest."
Kenneth Lux pointed out later in his book Adam Smith's Mistake, the founder of the dismal science of economics mistake was in not including the word "only" in the quote above. If it read, "It is not only from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own self interest," (Lux, op. cit., p. 124) then it is not an absolutist black/white statement, and its morality is restored.
Thomas Jefferson continued to write on the subject of self-interest in his 1814 letter to Thomas Law:
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