La riqueza de las naciones

Considered the founder of economic science for "The Wealth of Nations", the Scotsman Adam Smith (1723-1790) not only laid the foundations of a science with this work, but also of a doctrine: economic liberalism. The idea that wealth comes from labor (and not from gold or silver), being susceptible to increasing with adequate regulation of market functioning; the notion of competition as a mechanism that limits the thirst for profit and promotes the common good, and the desire for a strong, though not large, State that guarantees freedom, property, and the functioning of the "invisible hand" that harmonizes the interests of the individual and the community, are, in effect, his enduring contribution to the world that was to develop in the following centuries.