Economics did not begin with Adam Smith

Though some tend to believe that economics was formed out of the ether by Adam Smith, economic thought had been developing since the ancient Greeks. The reality is that Adam Smith's contributions to economics lead to an errant diversion as his ideas, along with those of David Ricardo, became the precursors of the fallacies of Karl Marx.

Murray Rothbard, the dean of the Austrian School of Economic, documented the ebb and flow of economic thought through the ages in an article recently republished at Mises.org.

In addition, Rothbard wrote two volumes of a planned three volume set on the Austrian perspective of economic thought before his untimely death. These books are available at the Mises.org store and are great reads for anyone interested in the history of economic thought.