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Tableau économique

François Quesnay · 1759

Quesnay's 1759 diagram of agricultural flows in the economy, the physiocratic model that Smith discussed with Quesnay in Paris and later critiqued in The Wealth of Nations.

Smith discussed this physiocratic model with Quesnay in Paris and critiqued it in Book IV of The Wealth of Nations.

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Scan of the Tableau économique, a printed diagram with columns labeled Dépenses productives, Dépenses du revenu, and Dépenses stériles, showing numbers in rows with dotted lines connecting flows of money between the columns, with handwritten annotations.
François Quesnay, Tableau économique, 1759.

About this source

What it is

This is a printed diagram created by French economist François Quesnay in 1758-59. It uses columns and dotted lines connecting figures to show how money and goods flow between landowners, farmers and merchants in an agricultural economy.

Why it matters

Quesnay's Tableau laid out the physiocratic theory that land and agriculture, not trade or industry, were the true source of a nation's wealth. Adam Smith met Quesnay in Paris in 1766 and discussed this very system with him. Smith later used Book IV of The Wealth of Nations to challenge the physiocrats, arguing that labour and trade also create wealth, not just farming. The Tableau shows the kind of economic thinking Smith was reacting against when he built his own theory.

Look closer

  • Why might a diagram with numbers and arrows be a convincing way to argue about the economy?
  • Whose work does this model leave out or undervalue?
  • What questions would you ask Quesnay about the merchants and artisans in his model?

This document is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Adam Smith on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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