An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, thus defined Adam Smith, the book that would change the systematics of the commercial governments of the time and the entire structure of the conception of the world before the full industrial revolution. In 1776, the "wealth of nations", as it became known, a work of 5 volumes, which absolves and guides all liberal thought, in a free market economy regulated by the government.
For current economic thinking at the time, this work became a moment of inflection: practically a manual of social practices and human relations within the recent industrial environment created by mechanization. It deeply analyzes capital relations in commercial societies (since the economic base at the time was the exchange of goods and currency circulation), the division of labor, its impacts on the worker, the distribution of income and the accumulation of capital.
The volumes are filled with historical considerations, footnotes, empiricism and inferences that demonstrate a society much more related like a spider's web than like a taut strand of string.
This publication, in fact, starts the process of discussions between social relations as opposed to capital relations between people, companies and nations.
The revolutionary concept of the invisible hand of the market, ironically, stems from the controversy of empathy and moral considerations. Where, for him, the entrepreneur of the business, even if he doesn't want to, brings benefits for the well-being of society through the price of his goods and by paying a fair wage to his employees.
Also from him is the phrase: "It is not the benevolence of the baker, the butcher or the brewer that I hope my dinner will come out, but rather their efforts to promote their self-interest." This sentence sums up very well what is permeated in his work.
In the case of the origin and use of money, synthetically, it states that the division of labor, the production of work itself, cannot satisfy all the worker's needs, that is, in some precise measure of the productive process and the social relations that imply it.
In the history of commerce, different commodities have served as a common medium of exchange. Out of necessity, nations opted for metals, which are durable and divisible, for this purpose.
Before coinage, people had to weigh and evaluate with each exchange, or risk fraud on society. Stamping metal, on one side only, to check purity, or on all sides, to stipulate purity and quantity.
The amount of real metal in the coins has decreased, due to the "avarice of princes and sovereign states", allowing them to pay their debts only on appearance and to defraud creditors.
In fact, as governments regulate their currencies, the possible frauds just stopped being about the minting of the currency and its market value, and started to change the way bonds are issued and the government's willingness to over or undervalue the currency to maintain its artificially stable economies.
And this is the point: cryptocurrencies evidence such an act because they cannot be manipulated by demand or supply.
The cryptocurrency system offers all the appropriate tools so that currency manipulation is reduced and, as a result, there is a better distribution of monetary values and more transparency in the way the economy is conducted.
Adam Smith defines that the private sector should act freely, with little or no government intervention, being an advocate of free banking (free banking system).
The free competition between the various suppliers would not only lead to a drop in the price of goods, but also to constant technological innovations, in an eagerness to lower the cost of production and beat the competition.
This clearly translates into the cryptocurrency system - or at least the part where people don't want to cheat others through the system.
The honest part of cryptocurrencies may be the long-awaited economic justice Smith places through fair earnings and free market competition.
By empowering investors and allowing them to make profits without depending on intermediaries or government moods, the cryptocurrency system reflects Smith's wishes.
Smith, in one class put it: "The merchant or trader, moved only by his own interest (self-interest), is led by an "invisible hand" to promote something that was never in his interest: the welfare of society ."
As a consequence of this "invisible hand", the price of goods should go down and wages should go up. And, as wages rise, more capital would be injected into society, increasing the demand for goods, which would go down even further by economic laws, causing more wealth to be distributed among the workers.
Too bad, in practice, this doesn't happen in the real world.
But, reading this message, you get the feeling that this is exactly what is happening in cryptocurrencies!
Long live Adam Smith then!