Response

Paper details:
The readings for this week cover the ‘Earliest Economic Thought’ (excerpts from the Bible, Aristotle and Aquinas) and the ‘Commercial Revolution’ (excerpts from the mercantilists and physiocrats: Mandeville, Mun, Cantillon, Quesnay, Turgot). Choose at least one writer from section I and at least one writer from section II to frame your response to the

Wealth—one common theme of the excerpts for this week—is referenced and analyzed in several ways in the texts. In your response, choose at least two distinct ways that wealth is discussed in the readings—e.g. we see questions regarding: the morality of the accumulation of wealth (the ‘gain motive’); the origins of wealth; the relationship between money, wealth and labor; the distribution of wealth; surplus; profiting from trade; etc.—and explain how different writers construct their analyses of the topic.