Note 170 — Chapter II · : ADAM SMITH

For Smith oppression meant the tyranny either of producers or consumers. When profits are above the normal rate “it is a proof that something is either bought cheaper or sold dearer than it ought to be, and that some particular class of citizens is more or less oppressed either by paying more or by getting less than what is suitable to that equality which ought to take place, and which naturally does take place among all the different classes of them.” (Ibid., Book IV, chap. 7, part iii; vol. ii, p. 128.)

The correspondence between selling price and the cost of production seemed to Smith to be of the very essence of justice. Complete correspondence would realise the ideal of the just price.