It’s no accident that the descendants of the Vikings designed economies with some of the same characteristics that governed their boats: a broad vision harnessed to practical action, relying on solidarity and teamwork. This combination of ambition and community promotes both freedom and equality, and those of us who share those values can learn from their story, which begins with the willingness to leave safe harbors—to venture out (Lakey, 2017, loc 170)
Sachs has changed his mind about the practicality of laissez-faire economics. Reviewing the evidence, he wrote in Scientific American that the high-tax/high-spending Nordic countries have outperformed the low-tax/low-spending countries like the United Kingdom. “Most of the debate in the U.S.,” he writes, “is clouded by vested interests and by ideology. Yet there is now a rich empirical record to judge these issues scientifically” (quoting Sachs, 2006 in Lakey, 2017, loc 2230)
The notion of Ambition&Community from the Nordic Model (the subject of the Lakey book) is quite consistent with the Metaeconomics frame and theory which points to interdependence, represented in jointness, and the need to find good balance in Self&Other-interest, and, then, writ large, to find good balance in Market&Government. Lakey (2017) is about how the Scandinavian countries of Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Iceland have achieved a balance that represents a Capitalism that is working better than that in the more neoliberal, Self-interest based Market-only countries. The latter is prevalent in the current US (and UK), starting especially in the early-1980s. It is also prominent in a number of other Spaceship Earth countries that also trace their historical lineage to laissez-faire economics (i.e. paying attention only to Smith, 1776/1789 while ignoring Smith, 1759/1790) coming out of Britain in the 18th and 19th century (i.e. Market-only economics, like Neoclassical Economics), including Australia, Canada, and Ireland (Lakey, 2017, loc 2230, again referring to Sachs, 2006). Chile also comes to mind as another country, where people tried an extreme version of the neoliberal frame and theory; it did not work, until balance was brought into it. As Sachs (2006) points out, regarding the lack of balance in the neoliberal economies (from Lakey, 2017, loc 2236):
The contrast is stark: in the Nordic group the average portion of the budget given to social purposes is 27 percent of the gross domestic product, and in the Anglo-Saxon group it’s just 17 percent. He asks whether it’s true, as claimed by followers of influential free-market economist Friedrich Von Hayek, that the high taxes needed to pay for high levels of social insurance reduce prosperity. “On average, the Nordic countries outperform the Anglo-Saxon ones on most measures of economic performance … Von Hayek was wrong.” In his conclusion, Sachs says that the Nordic model is not Von Hayek’s “road to serfdom” but instead is the path to “fairness, economic equality and international competitiveness.”
In formal Metaeconomic terms (see What is Dual Interest Theory), the “road to serfdom” is path 0M, or, in extreme versions of the Hayek frame, the horizontal axis…only Other-interest. The neoliberal path that Hayek favored is path 0G, or, even the vertical axis… only Self-interest. The Nordic Economies favor neither the neoliberal nor the serfdom paths, instead seeking path 0Z which sees the role of both frames… Self&Other-interest. So, how did it all come about in the Nordic Economies? What is the character of the path 0Z on which the Nordic Economics travel around this Spaceship Earth?
Lakey (2017) brings the story to life, starting with a brief history of the evolution of the economy in the Nordic Countries… all using a version of “Viking Economics”… starting in the late-1800s. It is especially a story of Norway, but also including Sweden and Denmark, and, highlighting the most “Viking” of them all, Iceland. The story starts with widespread poverty and extreme inequality in income and wealth that prevailed from the late-1800s well through the 1930s. It is the extreme inequality which also explains the mass emigration of Nordic people to the US during this time, especially the Norwegians who, to this day, are concentrated in North Dakota, and to some extent in Minnesota. It was the vow of Nordics at that time to eliminate poverty, a vow that has conditioned the Nordic Model. The frame was dramatically changed from that of poverty being somehow natural… which is a neoliberal, Neoclassical Economics frame, or that it arises from Government intervention, as in the related Hayek ("serfdom") frame… to the frame that poverty is something people, together in Community (with enough Ambition), can effectively eliminate.
How? Well, pretty simply, really… and, as the Lakey story unwinds, we find out more exactly how it has been accomplished, with a few bumps on the way. Lakey (2017, loc 117) points out how in the late-1800s and well into the early-1900s, the wealth gap in the Nordic Countries, especially in Norway and Sweden, was huge and widening. Capitalism had failed. The economic elites and the politicians being supported by same had become perhaps unwilling or unable to move toward economic justice and prosperity broadly spread across all people. It seems there was only economic prosperity for a few, and essentially no prosperity or justice for anyone else. It was also a challenging area in which to Make Wealth… very little agricultural land, cold and short growing seasons, some forests. Fishing was about the only really viable natural resource related industry. The oil resource that would eventually be found in the North Sea was not known. Daunting landscape, especially in Norway with the mountains and fjords, made it difficult to transport goods, and, even to establish a shared Other-interest that in any sense could be considered National in scope: Communication was difficult. So, what happened?
Well, some of the problem was alleviated by emigration… hundreds of thousands (it was actually around 2 million, between 1820 and 1920, most of them after the 1860s) became immigrants, mainly in the US… leaving the limited resources for fewer people to draw upon. Many came especially into the northern tier US areas like North Dakota and Minnesota, in which there was still land for homesteading, as well as other economic opportunities. Intriguingly, many also brought ideas into the US that were stirring action in the Nordic Countries at the time. It was about how to bring democracy back into capitalism, as represented in such things as the massive build-up of cooperatives, especially in North Dakota where the Norwegians concentrated.
Lakey (2017, loc 158) sets the stage for what was done, and, it is an ongoing project, with much that could be learned for the neoliberal economies like in the UK and the US; in fact, only seven decades later:
...Norway had achieved full employment, dramatically curbed poverty, built an efficient and modern infrastructure, and provided good free health care, retirement benefits, and free education for all of its citizens. That Norway achieved this before oil in the North Sea came online is remarkable, as is the fact that Sweden, Denmark, and Iceland all did the same—all of them without oil. It is easy to forget the magnitude of this transformation.
The most fascinating feature of this transformation is the practicality of it, e.g. ensuring every Human is given full access to the best education possible throughout their lifetime… a good start and continuing education for everyone. Like pointed to in Lakey (2017, loc 265), why not stir the most important resource to achieve as much as possible… as represented in a well-educated Human, over their entire life span? Pragmatic. Also, it was not all about low entropy, high energy content oil!
Also, every Human is given access to good, low cost health care. Why not have a healthy population? Makes sense. Also, as Humans move toward maximum entropy…and we all do so, to eventual death!... each is assured a reasonable standard of living in the later years with adequate retirement income as well as health care. Metaeconomics, too, points to the empirical test of what is pragmatic; do what works for everyone, not just for a select few of the economic and political elite. On what grounds… other than Self-interest only frames… can one justify not providing for access to education, health care, a decent retirement, a healthy natural environment… and, in general, keeping people out of poverty? The Nordic Model set out to eliminate poverty, through education, health care, retirement benefits, a sustainable environment, and, most importantly, to bring liberal democracy into the foundation and process of what became Nordic capitalism. What, more exactly, was done?
While low cost access to education and health care were key, and ensuring adequate retirement income has played a role, and having a sustainable natural resource system in the background of it all, perhaps the most important feature of the Nordic Model is represented in the idea of flexicurity, which was initiated in Denmark. The idea is that the Community, as represented in Government, would not necessarily ensure employment, but it would ensure that as companies adjusted to economic changes both locally and globally that workers would be given every opportunity to also adjust and adapt. The goal has been to ensure adequate support and retraining on the way too new jobs in an economy operated on liberal democracy principles. Also, companies could buy and sell, merge or not, as it was deemed good for capital investment. Yet, the goal is to achieve the well-being of the whole, not just the business managers and shareholders who sold out at a profit.
Such an economy also, then, means lots of diversity in the types of businesses, including not only the more typical neoliberal corporation, but also cooperatives and other kinds of companies with substantive involvement by labor in determining working conditions and compensation packages. There are no $300M/year CEO pay packages in the Nordic Model. Who could possibly be worth that much? Work is instead viewed as the way that everyone is involved in not only the economy but also in society, with everyone gaining from said participation. This is more about optimal inequality rather than a few capturing a disproportionate share of the outcomes from the economy. The deal is this: Everyone is expected to be a productive citizen, and, in turn, that person can also expect to be reasonably compensated for it. This also applies to immigrants, anyone aspiring to be part of the culture, economy and philosophy. In fact, work is the key aspect of immigration policy, especially in Norway (see Lakey, 2017, loc 343).
Has the progress been continual, smooth? No. In fact a major bump in the road appeared in the early-1980s. As Lakey (2017, loc 430) points out,
In the 1980s, Norway and Sweden turned away from what had been working for them and deregulated, giving the financial sectors the chance to act in their own, short-range interests. The private banks speculated, creating housing bubbles. The bubbles burst. Both nations headed into crisis. To understand what might seem incomprehensible, we need to understand the larger context. It is not easy for small nations to stay focused on their own vision and the wisdom of their own experience when giant nations are telling them they are wrong. Ronald Reagan was elected U.S. president in 1980. Margaret Thatcher became British prime minister in 1979. Both countries were widely respected in Scandinavia… Reagan and Thatcher shared an alternative vision: instead of freeing all individuals through increasing their opportunities, it was time to free owners to make more money, and that, they claimed, would trickle down and benefit everyone.
As Stiglitz (2019) makes clear, it did not work in the US. It also did not work in the UK. The result has been the move to populism, and positioning of both Donald Trump and Boris Johnson, and once again seeing the emergence of the face of Fascism, in both the UK and the US. Intriguingly, the Nordic countries tried it, too, and also failed… but saw the way to recover more quickly.
What did they do? Are there lessons that could be applied in the UK and the US, as well as the other countries who tried the neoliberal path (again, in Metaeconomics, path 0G, and, in extremes, the vertical axis)? The whole idea was to reduce the rules and regulations on the path to unfettered free markets; everyone would benefit, as Reagan and Thatcher proclaimed. As an side, their Neoclassical Economics, and Hayekian framers, also cheered… and, we might throw in Ayn Rand believers, too, like Alan Greenspan, the head of the Federal Reserve at the time of the 2008 crash.. Greenspan later admitted it did not work: The Market had proven unable to discipline itself. It had become clear that an unfettered (not Tempered and Bounded by the shared Other-interest, as Metaeconomics would have it) Market could not work.
One of the most striking differences in the way the Nordic Countries handled the 2008 crisis brought on by the neoliberal frame starting in the early-1980s (and still rampant in the US and UK) is the way the banks and financial markets in general were engaged. In particular, in contrast to massive, tax payer funded bailouts (including paying millions of dollars in bonuses to those who caused the financial disaster in the first place, as was done in the US), in Sweden, as a case in point, illustrative of the Nordic Model: “The government nationalized two of the banks, sheltered some that looked like they could survive, and took the attitude that the rest could go bankrupt. Stockholders were left empty-handed (Lakey, 2017, loc 450).” So, in the Nordic Model, if you take inordinate risks, you pay the price… the middle-class taxpayer does not. And, stockholders were not bailed out, no matter their level of wealth; bad investments need not be rewarded. In Norway, too, the Government showed little mercy for the banks... seizing three of them, fired senior management (the persons given bonuses in the US!), and put regulations back in place. As Lakey (2017, loc 485) says it: “The lesson to the entire financial sector was unmistakable: risk your own money, not other people’s.” And, Lakey (2017, loc 514),
Rejecting free-market ideology, they had largely returned to what works. St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank vice president Richard G. Anderson studied the responses of Sweden and Norway to their financial crises. He wrote, “The Nordic bank resolution is widely regarded as among the most successful in history.”
Rewarding bad judgement in banking and finance seems like Bad Capitalism, fed by neoliberal framing? No wonder the middle class in both the US and UK has gone populist (and, is playing with Fascism, which is even more dangerous).
Also, as demonstrated in the Swedish situation, it became clear that the kind of “one shot stimulus” when something goes awry, which is often and commonly used in places like the US due to the neoliberal, Self-interest frame continuing to fail, simply does not work. In Sweden, in contrast, it is more about an ongoing effort, operating all the time, such that when the neoliberal experiment in unfettered markets failed, Lakey (2017, loc 2703) points out how:
The government poured money into professional training and university courses, which naturally stimulated the economy while investing in the Human resource. In that period, according to Sweden’s present prime minister, Stefan Løfven, “Almost a million people got a chance to raise their education, which was very good, because when things started to go well, people were on a higher level.” …their famous social safety net worked to keep Swedes accessing health care, education, and job training programs, and maintained the jobs that provided those services. From this experience, some Swedish economists conclude that a high level of ongoing, thoughtful governmental intervention in the economy works better than occasional large spurts of stimulus. The result: by 2011, The Washington Post was calling Sweden the “rock star of the recovery,” with a growth rate twice that of the United States, much less unemployment, and a strong currency.
Perhaps the US (and other neoliberal based economies like the UK) could learn something from this empirical reality. As Lakey (2017, loc 485) says it, there is a need to avoid the “privatization of profits and socialization of costs” which is common in neoliberal, Self-interest only framing. Metaeconomics asks, empirically, just who is to enjoy the profits and who is going to pay the costs, as we search for reasonable… ethical and moral… outcomes. It is about using a Visible Hand to build context, build and operate on a shared Other-interest that works.
Another frame that came out of the move to the neoliberal, Self-interest only frame staring in the early-1980s was to weaken the labor unions, if not outright elimination of same. Reagan, in effect, eliminated the air traffic controller union in the US. Thatcher threatened the coal miner union with declaring a state of emergency and bringing in the military. Such moves were also afoot in the Nordic area. What was done? Massive walkouts and boycotts ensued.
The unions survived. And, why is this important? Metaeconomics provides an easy answer: It is all about meeting power with power, else the natural tendency in a capitalism not run on principles of liberal democracy just naturally concentrates the wealth in a few hands.
Unions play a crucial role in Nordic economies. As Lakey (2017, loc 1110) points out:
Strong labor movements bring an organizational cohesion and persistent advocacy that prevent an unraveling of the economic design for equality and freedom. John Weeks studied inequality in Australia, Canada, Germany, Japan, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States for the decades of the 1980s and ’90s, finding that declines in trade union membership were closely associated with widening income differences.
Said unions have had their challenges, but are still quite viable in the Nordic countries, greatly balancing out the Self&Other-interest in labor and management compensation packages, as well as in shareholder gains. Also, as with any Human organization, as Metaeconomics makes clear, Self-interest needs to be Tempered and Bounded, which includes the Self-interest of labor union leaders!
And, then, there are the cooperatives, with some bumps in that road, too. As Lakey (2017, loc 546) points out, regarding Iceland, and more severe economic problems than in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark:
Co-ops had once been a major force for Iceland’s economic development as it had been the others. Iceland’s co-op leaders, however, began to leverage political connections to gain subsidies while maintaining the movement’s inefficiencies, instead of innovating to solve problems. … saw cooperatives operating like “crony capitalists.” Sweden, Denmark, and Norway, … would not tolerate crony capitalism.
Cooperatives, due to being perhaps being the best example of how liberal democracy can be brought to bear in a capitalistic system, have played, and continue to play, a major role in the Nordic Model. Here, too, Tempering and Bounding, in this case, the Self-interest of coop leaders, is essential. The Iceland coops got out of Bounds.
What are some of the outcomes? One that a neoliberal, Self-interest frame would never predict: More innovation. The Self-interest frame suggests it cannot be, simply cannot happen, with too much Other-interest at work. Yet, this is not empirical reality: As Lakey (2017, loc 1006) highlights: “Rates of start-up creation in Norway are among the highest in the developed world, and Norway has more entrepreneurs per capita than the United States…” How could this be? Well, Metaeconomics explains it easily, as in a good Other-interest being in the background giving good context for pursuing Self-interest. As Lakey (2017, loc 1013) makes clear, there are clear shared Other-interest reasons:
In 2010, Max Chafkin did a survey of Norwegian entrepreneurs for Inc. Magazine, where he was a senior writer. While in Norway he noted the liveliness of the start-up scene. When he returned home he consulted Zoltan J. Acs, the chief economist for the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy. Chafkin asked why more Norwegians than Americans would be taking the risk of starting their own businesses. Acs said, “The three things we as Americans worry about—education, retirement, and medical expenses—are things that Norwegians don’t worry about.” Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody’s Analytics, in 2014 added another reason for start-ups lagging in the United States. Thirty-somethings, a demographic usually productive of risk-taking and start-ups, are often held back by student loan debt.
So, there you have it: A shared Other-interest in education (essentially no student loan debt), health care, and retirement... as well as ensuring a sustainable environmental and natural resource system... gives good context to being an entrepreneur. It is simply easier to pursue the Self-interest as an innovator and entrepreneur given a supportive, shared Other-interest in the background.
The neoliberal, Self-interest only frame also suggests that it is inequality that drives innovation. So, having the greatest inequality of any economy on this Spaceship Earth, the US leads in innovation, right? Not. In fact, the US lags behind a large number of the other countries in the Organization for Economic Development, including the Nordic countries, largely due to extreme inequality.
It is like the professional sports team that performs best has inequality, but not too much of it: There is an optimal amount of inequality for driving innovation, too, and the US is way off the mark, while the Nordic countries are close to it. Due to poverty, lack of health care, fewer opportunities to explore educational opportunities, and, perhaps due to matters of racism and other discriminatory practices not found as prominent in the Nordic Model, the US falls quite short of the possibilities.
Also, gender bias as represented in inferior, as compared to the Nordic Model, maternity leave practices... as just one indicator of gender discrimination, and, there are many other arenas of concern... in the US greatly reduces the potential contribution of at least one-half (female) of the population. As Lakey (2017, loc 1088) notes, “In 2015, the top five (places to be a Mother) were Norway, Finland, Iceland, Denmark, and Sweden. The UK was twenty-fourth, and United States thirty-third.”
And, then, there is the matter of the environment. How do the Nordic countries fare on the matter of such things as carbon and climate change, sustainable fisheries, air and water quality, and such? Well, the Nordic Model is built on sustainability principles, sensitive to thermodynamic reality, as is Metaeconomics. A case in point is the carbon problem, and the need to introduce solar driven energy into the mix. As Lakey (2017, loc 2636) describes it:
On very windy days, Denmark meets all of its electricity needs from wind power and even produces a surplus to export… Norway and Sweden trade renewables with their Danish cousins. The Nordic mountains across the Skaggarak have abundant hydropower, but when Norwegians and Swedes need more electricity, they import wind power from Denmark. When it needs to, Denmark imports hydroelectricity from Norway and Sweden. Norway would like more wind power, so it is taking advantage of its oil-rig-building expertise…
Yet, the oil wealth of Norway is also growing, but it is being used to build new infrastructure like roads and tunnels, invest in new boats and trains, and, also, to build the equipment to harvest solar energy, such as with the wind towers built using their oil-rig building experts. The oil wealth is also being saved in a massive fund, to be used for future generations after the oil runs out. The intent in both Norway and Sweden is to be carbon neutral by 2050 (Lakey, 2017, loc 2651).
In contrast, here in the US we have a “drill, baby drill (or is it now, frack, baby, frack!),” and burn it out as fast as possible before the environmentalists stop us! The contrast is huge. The oil wealth in the US is being Taken by a few, with no concern for building a sustainable environmental system, or in saving any of that wealth for future generations to be used after the oil runs out. Lakey (2017, loc 2992) points to one possible exception:
When North Dakota struck it rich in oil it knew from Norway’s experience that it is possible to gain public revenue from the oil and at the same time avoid dependency on that source. It therefore created what it calls a Legacy Fund for use in the longer run. Boom-and-bust has little allure when a population knows enough about the Nordic model to know that a much better alternative exists.
Maybe it is all those North Dakota Norwegians/Vikings still at work!
Lakey (2017) closes out the book with the question: How relevant is the Nordic Model to the US (and, we might add, to any other country currently running mainly on neoliberal, Self-interest only principles)? Several arenas are considered (with Metaconomics framing used here to help make sense of each domain):
1. Culture: Claim that cultural differences keep the Nordic Model out of the neoliberal countries. Maybe. More likely it is the over emphasis on Self-interest only based profit, and lack of concern for building an Empathy based Community of shared Other-interest. And, really, what does culture really have to do with fundamental needs like low cost education and health care, widely shared, as well as bringing females into the work force on par with males (and bringing everyone else on the gender continuum into that same force) and providing for a reasonable income at retirement or everyone? Building a sustainable natural system, which is ongoing in the Nordic countries: Why would this not also be part of Good US culture? This is not about culture; it is about balance in Self&Other-interest, and bringing more influence from the Empathy based Other-interest into the economic system. It is not about culture, per se, except to the extent we develop a new Culture that sees the advantage of a widely shared Other-interest that has the recognized need for education, health care, retirement support, environmental sustainability... universally available to every race and gender, to every Traveler on Spaceship Earth.
2. Scale and homogeneity: The wide and deep scale of places like the US make it possible to do any and all of the more Community (Empathy based Other-interest) orientated things common in the Nordic Countries. Homogeneity has little to nothing to do with it: What exactly does homogeneity have to do with forming a widely shared Other-interest in such things as education, health care, retirement income, and a sustainable Spaceship Earth system for everyone? Empirical testing suggested by Metaeconomics would like say “nothing to do with it, at all.”
3. Moved too far away from the Nordic Model: The adjustments would be substantial, in that Community has been largely extracted from Economic Framing (as Marglin, 2008, has made abundantly clear). The Nordic Model requires bringing Community back into Economy, in a balance of Economy&Community not currently in vogue in the neoliberal economies that have evolved since the early -1980s. As a result, the US has moved to extreme inequality. In contrast, Nordic countries have sought to find the best inequality, i.e. an inequality that encourages Ambition without destroying Community.
4. Distrust Government too much: Said distrust is the result of the Narrative started in the early-1980s, touted by politicians like Reagan and Thatcher, that Government can only do Bad while the Market can only do Good. Cronyism is rampant in the US (and the UK, as well, as another neoliberal economy) as the result, with the economic and political elite running all things: Perhaps a Good Government could fix that problem, and bring trust in Government back to the fore. Voters have to vote for Good Politicians, not those bought and paid for by the economic elite, using lots of dark money.
5. Inequality just natural in markets, so, accept it: Markets do not create inequality. Excessive, unbounded and not tempered Greed does...which leads to an entitlement frame of mind. The frame needs to be changed to focus on the search for optimal inequality: Some is good, too much or too little is bad. And, this is not about Taking money from those who Made it; it is about finding ways for each person to Make it, which is made possible with things like a good start and then ongoing, continuing education.... as well as reasonable compensation packages for everyone.
6. Big money corrupting the system: It is an empirical fact that big money is buying politicians. The ruling by the US Supreme Court in the Citizens United case, allowing dark money into buying politicians, needs to be changed.
7. Movements in `30s, `60s, and after the 2008 crash did not work, so why would it work now? Well, it is a matter of degree. The `30s produced Glass-Steagall to regulate banks, and created social security. The `60s produced the Civil Rights Act and the Great Society programs, and the US Environmental Protection Agency, to list just a few things. The 2008 crash brought back a few of the `30s insights on how to deal with excessive Greed in the financial industry. It is likely that massive walkouts, boycotts, and revival of both the unions and the cooperatives could go a long way to bringing about a more Nordic Model styled economy in the now neoliberal countries like the US and UK. In fact, peaceful and non-violent organization may be necessary to avoid moving in the direction of Fascism, which has re-surfaced (much as it was around in the `30s) due to the failure of neoliberal capitalism (i.e. trickle down economics is a myth) to produce a reasonable sharing of gains for everyone.
8. Building movements for a shift in balance of power: People in the US know how to build unions and cooperatives, build environmental movements for cause, and to otherwise (e.g. place labor representatives on corporate boards of directors) bring democratic principles into business and industry. It is just time to step forward and do it, with encouraging signs among the youth that it is coming.
And, all of this is about Jointness, Interdependence, and Balance... as in Self&Other-interest, Economy&Community, Conservative&Progressive, Republican&Democrat, Market&Government. The Nordic Model is just a different, perhaps more workable... practically speaking, like the Viking boats... balance?
The Viking boats are on the horizon! So, should we help them dock, learn from them on how to build a Viking Economy? What think?
References
Lakey, George. Viking Economics: How the Scandinavians Got It Right - and How We Can, Too. Kindle ed. Brooklyn, New York: Melville House Publishing, 2016, 2017.
Marglin, Stephen A. The Dismal Science: How Thinking Like an Economist Undermines Community. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2008.
Sachs, Jeffrey D. “The Social Welfare State, Beyond Ideology.” Scientific American, November 1, 2006.
Smith, A. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Edited by E. Cannan. New York: Random House, 1776/1789.
———. The Theory of Moral Sentiments. Edited by D.D. and A.L. Macfie Raphael. Indianapolis, Indiana: Liberty Fund, Inc., 1759/1790.
Stiglitz, Joseph E. People, Power and Profits: Progressive Capitalism for an Age of Discontent. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 2019.