Postscript to Adam Smith’s critique of the herring bounty

Earlier this month (6-8 July), I had surveyed Part #11 of Adam Smith’s 1784 pamphlet, Additions and Corrections to the First and Second Editions of Dr. Adam Smith’s Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Smith 1784, pp. 13-22), where Smith analyzes and critiques British herring subsidies. For reference, links to my herring-subsidy posts are below: The herring subsidy scam (6 July 2026) Adam Smith’s *negative invisible hand* (7 July 2026) Some closing thoughts on Adam Smith’s critique of the herring bounty scam (8 July 2026) As a short postscript to my three-part survey, I would now like to bring to your attention a follow-up paper by John Leazer, a scholar who specializes in British history. Professor Leazer’s fascinating paper, which I had not discovered until after writing up my three posts above, is titled “A Case for Subsidies? Adam Smith and the Eighteenth Century Scottish Herring Fishery” and is available here (via JSTOR). In brief, Leazer surveys the…