Moral Authority Jumpstarts Markets

When an intellectual has established moral credibility, their technical or policy recommendations can be received as moral commands, accelerating social acceptance and large-scale behavioral change. Daniel Klein argues Adam Smith’s standing as a moralist made The Wealth of Nations not merely an economic treatise but a moral endorsement of honest income-seeking, which helped normalize market activity and contributed to the Great Enrichment. — This reframes how ideas spread: who says something (moral authority) can matter as much as what is said, affecting adoption of economic norms and policy.