However, what we do know is that a free market requires management people today aren't accustomed to. Suddenly you are fully responsible to negotiate protection, transit, etc. That is a burden many would find off-putting and, in many cases, something beyond their capabilities.
If we were magically dropped into a free market tomorrow it is likely we would quickly attach ourselves to whomever is willing to give us those things without needing extra thought, just like the monopoly does today, and – tada – we're right back to the way things are right now.
If we were born into a free market and didn't know anything else then monopolies might be harder to pull off. That said, while the initial conditions were a bit different, we've been in a similar situation before and the monopoly won in the end.
[–] WalterBright 2 days ago
[–] win311fwg 2 days ago
[–] WalterBright 2 days ago
There's a continuum between free markets and socialism. It is not a binary thing. Nothing human is perfect. You might as well claim there is no such thing as water because 100% water is not achievable (there are always contaminents).
Also, a free market requires a government. The role of government is to protect life, liberty, and property.
[–] win311fwg 2 days ago
Uh, what? That's like saying there is a continuum between cold and far. Your comparison points are not in the same realm. Consider a free market where all actors decide to form cooperatives. That, however unlikely in practice, would result in both free markets and socialism at the same time. A free market does not care about how the people decide to divvy up capital. The people deciding to share ownership in the capital is perfectly valid within a free market. If "free market" was prescriptive about how people must trade then it would be completely contradictory.
> Also, a free market requires a government. The role of government is to protect life, liberty, and property.
Absolutely not. In a free market, one negotiates with private vendors to offer these services. A government is the antithesis of a free market, being a monopolistic vendor that you don't get to opt out of. A voluntary organization could emerge in a free market to provide those services to those who wish to join without having to individually negotiate, which would closely resemble the governments we know, but key is that it membership is optional. What makes a government more than an association is that you don't get to choose. The market cannot be free if you cannot choose who to buy from.
You could more reasonably say that there is a continuum between free markets and planned economies. It is still flawed as none of this is one-dimensional, but for the sake of simplification we can run with it. The space between is referred to as mixed economy, not free market.
[–] WalterBright 1 day ago
[–] win311fwg 1 day ago
A "free market" where the market isn't free doesn't make sense linguistically or within what "free market" is defined as. Of course a situation where some submarkets are unconstrained and others restricted can exist — not only can, that's how we already live — but when that occurs we call it a mixed economy. Our current world exists under a mixed economy.
I suspect your confusion stems from trying to apply the ideas of free market, which refers to a broad market economy, onto only the submarkets that are unconstrained. If you could magically ignore all the restricted markets then your logic would be reasonable, but in the real world we cannot ignore the rest of the world around us. It exists whether you like it or not. Unfortunately there is no generally accepted term for this, which is no doubt why you've wanted to use "free market" to fill the void, despite it already having a different meaning, but "unregulated market" is the one I have seen used most often in that context. You might consider using that going forward. I expect most will understand what you are trying to say without confusing them into thinking you are talking about free market in the proper sense and will allow you to converse with those who already made it clear that they were talking about free market in the proper sense.
[–] WalterBright 1 day ago
No, it isn't.
Again, look up the definition of it rather than make up your own. Here's one from wikipedia:
"In economics, a free market is an economic system in which the prices of goods and services are determined by supply and demand expressed by sellers and buyers."
It still requires a government to keep people from stealing, defrauding, and murdering each other.