Russ Roberts

One of the great debates of our time is about how much of your money should be spent by the state and how much you should keep to spend on your family.

Here is one such economist.

I thought, well, I don't have to read this because it's not economics.

It's philosophy or psychology, you could call it.

And I didn't read it forever.

Most economists don't.

And where's Roberts today?

I am president of Shalem College in Jerusalem, Israel.

I am the host of Econ Talk, the podcast and author of How Adam Smith Can Change Your Life, an unexpected guide to human nature and happiness.

So question one, how did Adam Smith change your life?

So my book is an attempt to bring to the modern reader Adam Smith's forgotten masterpiece, The Theory of Moral Sentiments.

The Theory of Moral Sentiments tries to answer the question, why do we do anything that isn't just for ourselves?

Because we are self-interested.

We're not selfish.

although some of us are, but our nature is to be self-interested.

We put ourselves at the center of our universe, and yet we often do kind and thoughtful things for others.

And Smith was interested in understanding why that was the case, and that was what his book was about.

And I didn't read it forever.

What was that experience like, reading it?

You know, I picked it up.