Division of Labor and Supply-Demand

Smith is hardly the first to present a Division of Labor; Plato's concept of a three-tiered Polis is a less detailed version of the model.  But the focus of the latter is not Division of Labor; rather it is the commensuration between the needs of the Polis and the types of citizens who can fulfill them.  In other words, his primary interest is a balance in the relation between what has become known as Supply and Demand.  Now, at the heart of the Economic conflicts of the past two centuries is a dispute over the general way that that balance can be achieved.  According to one side, either there is an internal dynamic that tends towards it, or there is a transcendent force that guides towards it.  According to the other, evidence of either is lacking, requiring, instead, active planning to achieve balance, an approach that is condemned by the first side as interference.  So, there is tacit agreement regarding Supply-Demand balance as the fundamental goal of an Economic system, though those who advocate a laissez-faire approach do not seem to recognize that their very own 'Supply-side' Economics violates their own principle.