Social Philosophy: Economics, part 1 (of 2167?)

To add to the many other avenues of inquiry into the nature of things in God's universe that I am already involved in, I am taking up a study of Economics--true economics, not the Keynesian b.s. that is typically foisted onto the average college student. Part of my motivation is to be able to instruct my son, Samuel (who wants to study business and art), into a better philosophical model of how markets work. I will eventually read all the big names like Hayek, Von Mises, Adam Smith, etc., but right now I ran into an interesting person by the name of Jean-Baptiste Say. Here is a quote from him:

"A hard working laborer, I was told, fancied working by candlelight. He had calculated that, during his vigil, he burned a 4-penny candle, earning 8 pennies by his work. A tax on tallows and another on the manufacture of the candles increased by 5 pennies the cost of his luminary, which became thus more expensive than the value of the product that it could shed light upon. From then on, as soon as night fell, the workman remained idle; he lost the 4 pennies which his work could obtain him, and without the tax service perceiving anything out of this production. Such a loss must be multiplied by the number of the workmen in a city and by the number of the days of the year."

Taxes will never completely go away, but those imposing them need to know the polynomial curve of the relationship between lost production and revenue if the taxes get too high--if this is known by an enlightened leader(s) then taxes can be kept low to encourage the creation of wealth (which is not a static thing as the lefties would have you believe).