I am a bit concerned about this expression, "the market will do it"—there's even a joke in which a libertarian is asked how many people will it take to screw in a light bulb and answers, "None, the market will do it"—because it treats markets as if they were persons. But most of us know that the idea is that the task, whatever it is, will get done without government needing to stick in its fingers because free men and women are enterprising enough to get it done and make a living from it.
"…folks who insist that governments must address most problems in human communities…really show a distrust of human nature. Why they, then, trust governments is beyond me…"
Recently, as I was running out to get some groceries, I listened to KFI AM Radio, the Los Angeles all talk station and heard an ad for a company that provides other companies with the service of handling their human resources tasks. This reminded me of yet another local company, called Government Solutions, Inc., which specializes in providing private firms with the needed expertise to obtain various government permits to carry on their business. For example, a private developer has been trying hard to get a project involving 12 large homes built near Silverado Canyon, where I live, and this company has been leading the various battles with the several layers of government, including planning groups and courts, to get the deal done.
Now what caught my attention is the fact, easily noted around the country once you think about it, how readily such companies are started by various entrepreneurs simply because someone believes that there is a demand for their type of service. Frankly, I am not always very happy with how eager some of these entrepreneurs are to go into business as a sort of liaison between private firms and public agencies. That relationship seems to me altogether too cozy for comfort for those of us who are convinced that government and business alliance tends to perpetrate more harm than good. But let's leave that aside for the moment.
What is important is how responsive people are to the weirdest types of demands that spring up in a community. Does this not suggest that if the government itself got out of trying to solve every other problem people face, there would be a great many entrepreneurs who would step in to handle them? In short, the market is very likely, indeed, to do it and all the complaints that we need the government to get things done tend to stem from a bad—the governmental—habit, not from serious reflection and historical evidence.
Of course, it is difficult if not impossible to fully anticipate just how in particular the market will respond. If there is a need for old age security provisions, product quality control, workplace safety measures, and all the rest, precisely how markets will meet the need may be impossible to predict. Just as sometimes when a person is asked the question, "Well, what are you going to do (in some novel situation)?" the best answer could be, "I don’t know but I'll think of something," so it is with how people in a market system will address various needs—they will most likely think of something.
What this suggests to me is that folks who insist that governments must address most problems in human communities—big ones, small, medium, immediate, or long range ones—really show a distrust of human nature. Why they, then, trust governments is beyond me, since all governments are is a bunch of human beings equipped with the most dangerous of all tools, raw, aggressive power. So these folks appear to believe that men and women in the market place, since they are forbidden to use aggression to make things happen, simply are useless, whereas governments that wield such power are just the ticket for solving problems.
The truth, however, is precisely the other way around. Governments and their tool, aggressive power (exhibited by the police and the military) are at most useful in defending against criminals and invaders from abroad. They are, however, not much use for anything else—to get anything done, they actually need to conscript labor and talent from the market.
So, yes, the answer is, the market (i.e., free men and women) will do it. Far better than government.
June 23, 2011
We are delighted to present Lessons in Freedom, essays by Dr. Tibor Machan, for your pleasure.
Dr. Machan holds the R. C. Hoiles Chair in Business Ethics & Free Enterprise at Chapman University's Argyros School of B&E.
