Born on April 18, 1772 in London, David Ricardo was the third of seventeen children in a Sephardic Jewish family that emigrated from The Netherlands to England right before his birth. When he was 14 he helped out his father by working at the London Stock Exchange where he learned about money and finance. At 21, Ricardo rejected his orthodox Jewish beliefs and married a Quakeress, Priscilla Anne Wilkinson, which did not make his father happy. After his family disinherited him from marrying outside his Jewish faith, he moved on and made a fortune as a stockbroker and a loan broker. Around that time Ricardo became a Utilitarian.
By the age 42, Ricardo’s work with the stock exchange had made him very wealthy and he was able to retire from his business in 1814. After that he bought an estate in Gloucestershire and moved to Gatcombe Park. In 1819, Ricardo purchased a seat in the British parliament as a representative of Portarlington, which was a borough of Ireland. He kept that......
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Approximate Pages: 3 (260 words per double-spaced page) |