What Do You Think of Smith's Work?

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Anee he the beacon: How do you see your work relating to smith? Because there's certain overlaps, obviously. So essentially, what we describe as inclusive economic institutions versus extractove economic institutions is more or less what smith describes. He didn't go tothe political level but kind of really understood how incentives were. And that's where our notions of inclusive and extractive political institutions come into play.

Daron Acemoglu of MIT and author (with James Robinson) of Why Nations Fail talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in his book: why some nations fail and others succeed, why some nations grow over time and sustain that growth, while others grow and then stagnate. Acemoglu draws on an exceptionally rich set of examples over space and time to argue that differences in institutions--political governance and the inclusiveness of the political and economic system--explain the differences in economics success across nations and over time. Acemoglu also discusses how institutions evolve and the critical role institutional change plays in economic success or failure. Along the way, he explains why previous explanations for national economic success are inadequate. The conversation closes with a discussion of the implications of the arguments for foreign aid and attempts by the wealthy nations to help nations that are poor.