A Universally Translatable Explication of Adam Smith’s Famous Proposition on 'The Extent of the Market'

Abstract

Following Smith’s line of argument, we discuss the semantics of four economic principles in Chapter III of the 'Wealth of Nations' that compose Adam Smith’s famous proposition “that division of labour is limited by the extent of the market.” We apply the Natural Semantic Metalanguage framework in linguistics to produce an explication that is clear and plain, cross-translatable into any language, intelligible to twenty-first century readers, and faithfully close to the original text. Our paper demonstrates that Smith’s ideas can be shared among speakers with different linguacultural backgrounds in line with the truly global view of economics that, we argue, Adam Smith had in mind: economics intended as the science of all people living and doing things together with other people so as to live well and to feel good.

Keywords: Adam Smith, division of labor, the market, lexical semantics, natural semantic metalanguage

JEL Classification: B12, Z13