Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot was born in 1727 in France and died at age 54 from Gout. He was appointed as Chief Administrator for the Limoges District under Louis XV from 1761 to 1774 and as Minister of Finance, Trade and Public Works from 1774 to 1776 under Louis XVI. As Minister under Louis XVI, Turgot "ended the government's policy of conscripting labor to build and maintain roads, and replaced it with a more efficient tax in money", which Economist Milton Friedman defined as "one of the greatest advances in human freedom." Turgot also abolished the Guild System. "Louis XVI did not welcome Turgot's reforms and dismissed him in 1776." His book, which argued against government intervention in the economic sector, "Reflections on the Production and Distribution of Wealth", interestingly enough, predated Adam Smith's famous "Wealth of Nations" by 6 years. "Turgot recognized the function of the division of labor, investigated how prices were determined, and analyzed the origins of economic growth." He also recognized before Adam Smith the importance of the division of labor in an economy. "Turgot also was the first economist to recognize the law of diminishing returns in agriculture. Predating the marginalists by a century, he argued that each increase in an input would be less and less productive." His most noted contribution to the study of economics has been "to point out that capital was necessary for economic growth, and that the only way to accumulate capital was for people not to consume all they had produced."
According to "The Fortune's Encyclopedia of Economics", "in Reflections Turgot analyzed the interdependence of different rates of return and interest among different investments. Interest is determined by the supply and demand for capital, said Turgot. Although the rates of return on each investment may vary, he argued, in a competitive free-market economy with capital mobility, rates of return on all investments will tend toward equality."
Works by Anne-Robert-Jacuqes Turgo:
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