In article <199805070727.AAA26...@cybere.creative.net>, "Vincent Cook"

I found and downloaded Cantillon's essai and a work by Turgot; I have now
skimmed the former but not yet gotten to the latter. So far as Cantillon
is concerned, while he certainly anticipates Smith in various ways, to
describe him as more libertarian, more pro-laissez-faire, etc. is, to put
it mildly, inaccurate. Insofar as there is a maximand in his essay it is
not, as in Smith's case, the welfare of the population but the power of
the state.

Since Vincent illustrated Smith's supposed evils with selective quotes and
references, I will do the same for Cantillon, along with the relevant bits
from Vincent (this post and another). Since I am selecting for passages
that contradict Vincent's picture, my quotes will make Cantillon look
somewhat worse than he actually is--and hopefully provide Vincent an
incentive to go read him for himself, assuming I am right in believing
that he has not so far done so.

Or in other words, the total amount purchasers spend on beef is roughly
independent of its price. If you think you can square that with even a
rough understanding of how subjective utility affects price formation, I
would be interested.

"If the proprietors of land and the nobility in Poland would consume only
the manufactures of their own state, bad as they might be at the outset,
they would soon become better, and would keep a great number of their own
people to work there, instead of giving this advantage to foreigners: and
if all states had the like care not to be the dupes of other states in
matters of commerce, each state would be considerable only in proportion
to its produce and the industry of its people."

"This is an example of a branch of trade which strengthens the foreigner,
lessen the number of inhabitants of the state, and without causing any
circulating money to leave it weakens the same state. I have chosen it to
show more strikingly how one state may be the dupe of another in trade,
and the method of judging the advantages and disadvantages of foreign
trade."

"It is by examining the results of each branch of commerce singly that
foreign trade can be usefully regulated. It cannot be distinctly
apprehended by abstract reasons. It will always be found by examining
particular cases that the exportation of all manufactured articles is
advantageous to the state, because in this case the foreigner always pays
and supports workmen useful to the state: that the best returns or
payments imported are specie, and in default of specie the produce of
foreign land into which there enters the least labour. "

"...  But I have no intention of entering into detail as to the branches
of trade which should be encouraged for the good of the state. Enough to
say that it should always be endeavoured to import as much silver as
possible."

"(I assume always that the comparative wealth of states consists
principally in the respective quantities of money which they possess)"

Vincent attributes to Cantillon "(6) specie-flow mechanism for monetary
equilibrium." This is in part true, but note that Cantillon writes:

"I consider in general that an increase of actual money causes in a state
a corresponding increase of consumption which gradually brings about
increased prices."

And makes it clear that the increase in consumption is real, and is a
benefit due to an inflow of gold. So he has the right result from the
wrong cause--unlike Ricardo, who gets the whole thing right.

Vincent writes (about Smith):

and

"If the Prince or administrators of the state wish to regulate the current
rate of interest by law, the regulation must be fixed on the basis of the
current market rate in the highest class, or thereabout. ...  But the
bankruptcy laws being favourable enough to debtors to allow them to start
again it seems that usury laws should always be adjusted to market rates,
as in Holland."

Which is precisely Smith's (mistaken) position.

Victor writes (about Smith):

"It is then undoubted that a Bank with the complicity of a Minister is
able to raise and support the price of public stock and to lower the rate
of interest in the State at the pleasure of this Minister when the steps
are taken discreetly, and thus pay off the State debt."

Smith is in favor of private banking and private money issuance, with some
qualifications; Cantillon is unambiguously in favor of a government bank
in small states, and believes that in large states a bank, with
cooperation of the government, can lower the interest rate in order to let
the state pay off its debt.

So far as the state monopoly on money is concerned, all I can find in
Cantillon is:

"But as silver can be combined with iron, lead, tin, copper, etc. which
are not such scarce metals and are minded at less expense, the exchange of
silver was subject to much fraud, and this caused several kingdoms to
establish mints in order to certify by a public coinage the true quantity
of silver that each coin contains... ."

From which it certainly sounds as though he approves of government coinage.

So far as relative support for the state, you have the positions of Smith
and Cantillon exactly reversed. Smith repeatedly makes it clear that what
he is concerned with is the welfare of the population, and that he is in
favor of keeping down the size and expenditure of the state--although not,
of course, to zero. Cantillon, on the other hand, writes:

"But a nobleman with his retinue and his horses is useful to the state in
time of war; he can always be useful in the magistracy and the keeping of
order in the state in peace time; and in every case he is a great ornament
to the country, while the monks are, as people say, neither useful nor
ornamental in peace or war on this side of heaven."

"And all things considered they [Princes and Heads of Republics] do not
perhaps so badly in working to perpetuate the glory of their reigns and
administrations, and to leave monuments of their power and wealth; for
since, according to the natural course of humanity, the state must
collapse of itself they do but accelerate its fall a little. Nevertheless
it seems that they ought to endeavour to make their power last all the
time of their own administration."

"It is true that it is of little difference in a state whether people are
accustomed to wear coarse or fine clothes if both are equally lasting, and
whether people eat nicely or coarsely if they have enough and are in good
health, since drink, food, clothing, etc. are equally consumed whether
fine or coarse, and that nothing is left in the state of this sort of
wealth.

But it is always true to say that the states where fine cloths, fine
linen, etc. are worn, and where the feeding is dainty and delicate, are
richer and more esteemed than those where these things are ruder, and even
that the states where one sees more people living in the manner of the
first named are more highly esteemed than those where one sees fewer in
proportion."

Or in other words, the only reason why it is better for people to consume
goods they prefer is that it improves the reputation of the state.

And along similar lines:

"If enough employment cannot be found to occupy the 25 persons in a
hundred upon work useful and profitable to the state, I see no objection
to encouraging employment which serves only for ornament or amusement"

So when everything that can be done to serve the state is done, Cantillon
thinks it harmless if any remaining labor goes to produce things that give
people pleasure.

"The convents of Mendicant Friars are much more pernicious to a state than
those of the closed orders. These last usually do no more harm than to
occupy estates which might serve to supply the state with officers and
magistrates, ..."

And you were complaining that Smith was trying to figure out how best to
serve the state? And for Cantillon's general view of ruler and ruled:

"The example of the prince, followed by his court, is generally capable of
determining the inspiration and tastes of the other proprietors of land,
and the example of these last naturally influences all the lower ranks. A
prince, then, without doubt is able by his own example and without any
constraint to give such a turn as he likes to the labour of his subjects."

While it is irrelevant to your points, the following suggests that
Cantillon's acquaintance with the demographic facts was a bit tenuous:

"We see daily that Englishmen, in general, consume more of the produce of
the land than their fathers did, and this is the real reason why there are
fewer inhabitants than in the past."

In conclusion:

1. Am I correct in believing that you have read neither Smith nor
Cantillon, and are simply relying on Rothbard's hatchet job?