Concept
Wealth
Overview
Wealth is the abundance of valuable financial assets or physical possessions which can be converted into a form that can be used for transactions. This includes the core meaning as held in the originating Old English word weal, which is from the Indo-European word stem, wel-, meaning "to wish" or "good". The modern concept of wealth is of significance in all areas of economics, and clearly so for growth economics and development economics, yet the meaning of wealth is context-dependent. A person possessing a substantial net worth is known as wealthy. Net worth is defined as the current value of one's assets less liabilities (excluding the principal in trust accounts).
At the most general level, economists may define wealth as "the total of anything of value" that captures both the subjective nature of the idea and the idea that it is not a fixed or static concept. Various definitions and concepts of wealth have been asserted by various people in different contexts. Defining wealth can be a normative process with various ethical implications, since often wealth maximization is seen as a goal or is thought to be a normative principle of its own. A community, region or country that possesses an abundance of such possessions or resources for the benefit of the common good is known as wealthy.
The United Nations definition of inclusive wealth is a monetary measure which includes the sum of natural, human, and physical assets. Natural capital includes land, forests, energy resources, and minerals. Human capital is the population's education and skills. Physical (or "manufactured") capital includes such things as machinery, buildings, and infrastructure.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where Wealth is discussed.
Some of the best English writers upon commerce set out with observing, that the wealth of a country consists, not in its gold and silver only, but in its lands, houses, and consumable goods of all different kinds. In the course of their reasonings, however, the lands, houses, and consumable goods, seem to slip out of their memory; and the strain of their argument frequently supposes that all wealth consists in gold…
Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
names the idea; states what it is; the book is about it; author linked in the graph; opens on it
We have a vast interest to preserve, and we possess great means of preserving it: but it is to be remembered that the artificer may be encumbered by his tools, and that resources may be among impediments. If wealth is the obedient and laborious slave of virtue and of public honour, then wealth is in its place, and has its use: but if this order is changed, and honour is to be sacrificed to the conservation of…
Edmund Burke, Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is
In almost every instance, it is an idle refinement to distinguish between the labour of those employed in agriculture, and of those employed in manufactures and commerce; for wealth is necessarily the result of both descriptions of labour, and consumption can no more take place independently of the one, than it can independently of the other. It is by their simultaneous concurrence that any thing becomes consumable…
Adam Smith, An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
states what it is; names the idea; the book is about it; author linked in the graph; opens on it
70) defines wealth as the material product of nature appropriated by labor for the wants of man. Carey (“Social Science,” i, 186) asserts that wealth consists in the power to command Nature’s services, including in wealth such intangible things as mental qualities.
John Stuart Mill, Principles of Political Economy
names the idea; states what it is; author linked in the graph; opens on it
Yet it is obvious that, on both occasions, his labour tended exclusively to what is allowed to be production: the one was equally indispensable with the other, to the ultimate result. Further, if we adopted the above definition, we should be obliged to say that a nation whose artisans were twice as skilful as those of another nation, was not, _ceteris paribus_, more wealthy; although it is evident that every one of…
John Stuart Mill, Essays on some unsettled Questions of Political Economy
names the idea; states what it is; author linked in the graph; opens on it
Philosophers who discussed Wealth
Related ideas
- Epicurus
- Epictetus
- Friedrich Nietzsche
- Indo-European languages
- John Stuart Mill
- John Locke
- Karl Marx
- Labor theory of value
- Capital (economics)
- Adam Smith
- Stoicism
- Old English
- Classical economics
- Property
- Science
- Social class
- Aristotle
- United Nations
- Normativity
- Business
- Epicureanism
- Social contract
- Working class
- Marxian economics
Opposing perspectives
Place in the tradition
Part of Communism.