Those who work in economic anthropology are aware of the importance of the
economy in public thought and debate. In retrospect, Adam Smith might well
have titled his book The health of nations, for in our day, if not in his, it seems
that the health of a country is defined by its wealth, just as the final judgement
of an activity is its bottom line, how it gains or loses money. And overweening
in our day is economics, whether the formal, theoretical economics of scholars
like Gary Becker, the more applied economics of bodies like the Federal
Reserve Board or the Bank of England, or the less rigorous economics of
public thought and debate.