This Scottish Philosopher is best known among economists by his very persuasive arguments againt British mercantilism, which was an essential building block to that form of economic ideology known as "Classical Economics". ..In fact, his work in this a rea greatly influenced the father of economics, Adam Smith. Hume basically proved that Britain's net exportation in exchange for gold, which was then hoarded by the British, would not enhance wealth..."as net exports increase and more gold flowed into that country, the prices of goods in that country would rise. The increase in domestic prices due to the gold inflow would discourage imports, thus lowering the amount of net exports of that country. This adjustment is known among economists as the "price-specie-flow mechanism".
Hume believed that economic freedom is a necessary condition for political freedom, which was further elaborated by Hayek in his famous work, "The Road To Serfdom" . He was also the first to consider the normative versus the positive issues of economics...later expounded upon greatly by Hayek's teacher, Karl Popper.
David Hume's Philosophical questions have embraced all of the social sciences, especially his work on what is known as "Hume's problem of induction", which deals with the problem of how any claims about unobserved generalizations are to be supported. Hume basically took the skeptic route and believed that there were no good reasons to believe generalizations about the world, no matter how much evidence one has. In conclusion, David Hume was probably the first vocal defender of the market economy.
Works by David Hume:
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