33 lines
1.1 KiB
Markdown
33 lines
1.1 KiB
Markdown
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# Exchange
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## Definition
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The act of trading one's surplus production for the goods produced by others.
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Smith presents exchange as the mechanism by which the division of labour
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translates into universal opulence: each workman disposes of their surplus
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output and receives in return the surplus of others, so that all are
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supplied beyond what any individual could produce alone.
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## Source Chapter
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Book I, Chapter 1: "Of the Division of Labour"
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## Context
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Exchange appears in the chapter's conclusion as the connecting mechanism
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between specialised production and general welfare. Smith implicitly treats
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it as prerequisite to the division of labour (explored further in Chapter 2),
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since specialisation only benefits workers if they can trade their surplus.
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## Economic Domain
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Exchange
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## Smith's Original Wording
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"Every workman has a great quantity of his own work to dispose of beyond what
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he himself has occasion for; and every other workman being exactly in the same
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situation, he is enabled to exchange a great quantity of his own goods for a
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great quantity or, what comes to the same thing, for the price of a great
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quantity of theirs."
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