Hans Stegeman has published a short essay on Smith, and how – unmoored from their moral foundations as outlined in "Theory of moral sentiments" – markets turn from coordinating value creation to peddling value extraction. In capitalism growth is an imperative: "When real productive growth is insufficient – [...] the machine turns to the next best thing: commodification of nature, rising debt, financial engineering, deregulation."

https://hansstegeman.substack.com/p/when-price-becomes-belief-markets

#economics
#bubbles
#AdamSmith

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