The Pursuit of Profit

Steven Suranovic

Chapter Chapter 6 in A Moderate Compromise, 2010, pp 113-131 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract Economists and others, who support globalization, tend to look favorably upon profit seeking by firms. Neoclassical economic models are built on the assumptions that firms maximize profit and consumers maximize utility. Adam Smith’s famous passage about the butcher, brewer, and baker is often used to suggest that self-centered, even egoistic, profit-seeking behavior can have positive effects for the economy: 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 interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages. (Smith, 1937, para 1.2.2)

Keywords: Free Market; Islamic Banking; Voluntary Exchange; Egoistic Behavior; Voluntary Transfer (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palchp:978-0-230-11460-9_6

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DOI: 10.1057/9780230114609_6

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