Meaning of invisible hand | Babel Free

Definitions

A metaphor for the principle that in a free market, an individual pursuing his own self-interest also tends to promote the good of his community as a whole.

Equivalents

Examples

“By preferring the ſupport of domeſtick to that of foreign induſtry he intends only his own ſecurity; and by directing that induſtry in ſuch a manner as its produce may be of the greateſt value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other caſes, led by an inviſible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention.”

“When Lucasians postulate that prices are ‘flexible’ they seem to mean that we can observe only Walrasian market-clearing prices. There is no nonsense here about the invisible hand doing any noticeable and comprehensible work: its task is accomplished by definition.”

“In short, Smith understood that the invisible hand is often benign, but not always.”

“Aha, they say, but extreme wealth is good for all of us. All will be uplifted by their god’s invisible hand. […]”

“Yet the carbon giants continue to reap $600 billion in annual subsidies from public coffers, not to speak of a greater subsidy: the right, in Klein’s words, to treat the atmosphere as a “waste dump.” ¶ So much for the invisible hand. As the science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson observed, when it comes to the environment, the invisible hand never picks up the check.”

“However, the mainstream pro-capitalist position, especially as flat-out climate-change denialism becomes less common in the ruling class, is that the invisible hand and mighty forces of ‘entrepreneurialism’ will definitely lead to the ‘fixing’ of the problem.”

CEFR level