Buddhist economics

• Course code - 101 405

Introduction to Economics and

Economy

Learning outcomes

• At the end of the lecture you will be able to • Define the economics • Explain its main branches • How it came into existence as a social science • Why and when Buddhism bridged with the

economics

Derivation of the term

The term economics comes from the Greek for “oikosnomos” which mainly can be discussed under two heads. • Oikos – home• Nomos – management

means custom or law, hence the term economics means “rules or laws of household”.

Definition

• A social science concerned chiefly with description and analysis of the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services

Merriam Webster

Definition

• Definitions of economics can be discussed under four main heads

1. Wealth definitions,2. Material welfare definitions,3. Scarcity definitions, and4. Growth-centered definitions

Definition

• Economics is the social science that studies the production, distribution and consumption of goods and services.

Adams Smith• Economics is the studies of ways in which

people use resources to satisfy their wants. John Sickle

Definition

• “The science which studies human behavior as a relationship between ends and scare means which have alternative uses.

Lionel Robbins“Economics is a study of man in the ordinary business of life. It enquires how he gets his income and how he uses it. Thus, it is on the one side, the study of wealth and on the other and more important side, a part of the study of man”

Alfred Marshall

Definition

• “Economics is the study of how people and society end up choosing, with or without the use of money, to employ scarce productive resources that could have alternative uses to produce various commodities over time and distributing them for consumption, now or in the future, among various persons or groups in society. It analyses costs and benefits of improving patterns of resource allocation”

Samuelson

Origins of the subject

• Adam smith is the one who introduce economics as a subject. In late 18th century 1723-1790 he wrote a book on economics which is entitled as wealth of nation. With the compilation of this book Adam smith was respected as father of modern economics. This text is considered as the magnum opus of Economics

Subject filed of economics

• Our wants are almost unlimited. Even the people are rich or poor there is never enough of everything to satisfy our wants. How to narrow the gap between what people want and what they are able to get is the basic problem studied in economics.

• Economics means the study of the way in which

mankind organizes itself to tackle the basic problems of scarcity

Two ways

There are two way of narrowing this gap. • Want less • Get more

Poets, religious proponents and philosophers advice us to take the first one. But the history evident that always we have taken the second one.

Branches of Economics

There are two branches of Economics, • Micro economics • Macro Economics

Micro economics

• Micro means small just as the rendered sense micro economics deals with the single unit of an economic system.

• How does an individual (or a family) decide on how much of various commodities and services to consume? How does a business firm decide how much of its product (or products) to produce?

• These are the typical questions discussed in microeconomics.

Macro Economics

• Macro means large so that macro economics deals with the branches of economic system. I

• While the micro economics deals with the individual income macro economics deals with the national income.

Economy

• The system of trade and industry by which the wealth of a country is made and used

Differences between Economy and Economics

• Economy indicates the system ( activities or the structure that the governments use to make money)

• Economic indicates the study or the scientific discipline

• Economy can be translated into Sinhala as Arthakramaya

• Economic can be translated into Sinhala as ArthaSastraya

Buddhist Economics• Even though the Buddhism is being endowed with

a rich philosophy of economics westerns did not touch it till late 1900. Complete credit of acquainting Buddhist economics as a subject goes to the Ernst Friedrich Schumacher who worked as a civil servant in Burma. In 1973 he published his book which was entitled as small is beautiful. His slogan “Small is beautiful” attracted worldwide attention as the crux of Buddhist Economics