hospodáství

The standard Czech term is hospodářství; if the form hospodáství appears, it is typically a misspelling. Hospodářství has two related meanings. In everyday language it refers to the management of resources within a household or estate, including budgeting, food production, and consumption, as well as the organization of labor and property. In a broader sense, hospodářství denotes the national economy—the system by which a country produces, distributes, and consumes goods and services.

At the micro level, a household's hospodářství involves income, expenses, savings, and debt, as well as the allocation of time and energy to work, childcare, and domestic tasks. At the macro level, hospodářství describes the aggregate economic activity across sectors such as agriculture, industry, and services, and the institutions and policies that influence production, trade, and growth. National hospodářství is analyzed with macroeconomic indicators such as gross domestic product (HDP), employment, inflation, and the balance of payments, and with policy tools in fiscal and monetary policy.

Terminology: the term is closely related to ekonomie, but in Czech usage hospodářství emphasizes the system of production and distribution as a whole. The related adjective hospodářský means economic or fiscal, and phrases such as rodinné hospodářství (family household) and národní hospodářství (national economy) are common.

Historical note: the concept originated in the management of estates and households and expanded with industrialization to cover broader economic activity and policy.