latter element, of course, involves the condition that the product be limited in supply, though this is not expressly stated.540 To be sure, the interest of the moral philosopher is also paramount here,541 as in the Politics passage. The thought is centered on fair exchange, as a phase of justice, rather than upon the problem of value. Nevertheless, his discussion reveals a clear insight into demand and cost of production as the two most important elements in economic value.542
WEALTH
Since Aristotle had a better apprehension of the theory of value than other Greek thinkers, we may expect him also to define more clearly the concept of wealth.
In the Politics, he names the following attributes of genuine (ἀληθινός) wealth (πλοῦτος):
- necessary to life;
- useful to persons associated in a household or a state;
- capable of accumulation (θησαυρισμός);
- limited in extent (οὐκ ἄπειρος).543
According to Mill,544 from the “economic” standpoint, wealth is “all useful and agreeable things” of a “material nature” possessing “exchange value”; and, to have exchange value, they must be “capable of accumulation.”
In comparing these two definitions, it should be recognized at the outset that Aristotle’s term “genuine” does not mean “truly economic,” as it might in Mill, but rather “legitimate wealth” as distinguished from that gained from false finance (χρηματιστική);545 also that his “necessary to life” and “limited in extent” are not used in the economic but in the moral sense, as opposed to luxury and extreme interest in money-making.