[roenxi]

If someone lives in Brazil, was born in Brazil and speaks Spanish though there is a reasonable chance that they are in fact not a Scotsman.

If there are consistent breadlines, that means someone is giving away a resource at below its value - free markets sort that out very quickly. They turn up for a few days then go away as prices adjust. Persistent problems only crop up when something regulatory is keeping prices down because the seller has huge incentives to raise them until people go away.

I'm not arguing the situation would be rosy, but breadlines just are not how free markets deal with the situation. Markets use price signals to allocate, not long queues. Not a controversial fact, although people do sometimes get very unhappy about it.

[GlennS]

Brazilians speak Portuguese.

[_clhx]

You miss the point. No one is saying capitalism will literally cause breadlines. They are saying capitalism has made breadlines needed in some circumstances. These are different things but related.