| Theoretically, in that ideal world of perfect competition, sure. One glimpse at our current reality will show that this is not what is working in practice. Agriculture, for example, is subsidised up the wazoo. Were it not, market forces would dictate that no agriculture is done at all unless it can turn a profit. Medication, for another example, is more expensive in the US than in any other place on earth. Market forces dictate that you pay hundreds of dollars for a commodity medication whereas in other distant lands the government negotiates a good price for its citizens. Market forces give you one, maybe two ISPs to choose from in your area that are expensive and slow, or bandwidth capped. Those market forces also collude to prevent new entrants into the market, e.g municipal providers. Market forces don't really invest in infrastructure, or shared infrastructure, unless they can get a return on the investment (e.g a toll road). Market forces will try to keep things cheap, like labour costs, which is why there is such thing as collective bargaining and unions to ensure a person's pay isn't optimised away. Market forces may also optimise away an entire industry or competence in favour of importing. This is how countries like the UK have transitioned to more of a service based economy and have also practically lost the capability to manufacture certain things. The overall point being that for all of the things where the invisible hand of the market works wonderfully (as it essentially does with consumer goods), there are just as many cases where that is explicitly not desirable and checks and balances (i.e regulation, collective bargaining, government) are required to ensure the market works in favour of society and not against it. The two things have to work in balance, having one without the other would lead to undesirable outcomes. |