...nefarious effects; on this Smith said that the division of labor "will turn working people into objects as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to be."15 The antidote was government action, which should be initiated to overcome devastating market...

...life in a job requiring repetitive operations might develop great skill in his trade while becoming "as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become." He became incapable of judgment in political issues and unable to defend his country if there...

...employments. The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects, too, are perhaps always the same, or very nearly the...ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become. The torpor of his mind renders him not only incapable of relishing or bearing a part in any...

...becomes extreme: "The man whose life is spent performing a few simple operations, of which the effects too are, perhaps, always the same, or very nearly...understanding, or to exercise his invention in finding out the expedients for removing difficulties which never occur. He naturally loses, therefore, the habit...

...result, Smith writes — in as blunt a statement as can be found in his works — a laborer of this kind "generally becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become" ( WN Vif5o, 782). He follows this statement with a litany of criticism that surpasses anything...

...life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects too are, perhaps, always the same, has no occasion to exert his understanding, or to exercise his intervention in finding our expedients for removing difficulties which never occur. He naturally loses,...