[vannevar]

"Free market" is an oxymoron. Without regulation, there is no market. Market rules were among the earliest types of law. The chief problem with our current system is that capital is largely unregulated. In capitalism, wealth flows uphill, and will naturally become more and more concentrated, eventually distorting both the markets and the political system. There has to be some active mechanism to oppose this uphill flow. The positive effect of capital regulation like progressive taxation isn't necessarily due to wealth redistribution to the poor (though there may be very valid moral reasons to do it), but rather wealth-decentralization to the less-wealthy. From a systems point of view, it's better to shift opportunity from someone whose chief qualification for it is their wealth, to several others who have less of a wealth advantage and so are more likely to be qualified on merit.

[trod1234]

We largely agree, except are you sure its capitalism that wealth flows uphill and not actually the money-printing fiat and their banker friends who are doing the debasement/stealing from everyone that holds dollars?

Non-reserve Money-printing creates runaway dynamics that inevitably allow state-apparatus to outcompete legitimate business in effect collapsing market over time.

[vannevar]

Yes, the money flows uphill. Having more wealth means being able to make more wealth, faster. It's a feedback loop. True, some of that comes from printing money. But value is actually being created all the time (which means some new money must be printed all the time), and capital will capture an ever-increasing share of the increasing pie. The rate of this increase is faster than the wealth is created. You can see this in the widening income growth gap between the top and the bottom. In turns out that a rising tide can indeed raise all boats, but it raises the boats at the top of the income curve much faster than those at the bottom, to the point where the boats at the bottom are only infinitesimally better off while the income of the rich is multiplied many times over.

[jokethrowaway]

In an unregulated market competitors will disrupt big business.

In a regulated market big business will bribe the government and keep its monopoly, increasing inequality between the top 0.01% and the plebs.

[bogomog]

The arc of the U.S. economy over the last 80 years contradicts your position. There has been reduced regulation since the Reagan administration, and also reduced competition. A few blips when internet companies "disrupted" an existing industry, but those industries fairly quickly consolidated on a small group of players.

[vannevar]

You're describing regulatory capture, which is true in unregulated capitalism. When I say "unregulated capitalism", I'm not talking about business regulation---I'm talking about regulating capital itself. In a healthy, regulated capitalist system, the political influence of individual companies is diluted and there is greater competition. Business regulation is always needed to ensure things like public safety, contract enforcement, and fair competition. But when disproportionately large players politically capture the regulatory machinery, they tilt the regulatory playing field towards themselves. This is a symptom, it is not the disease.