… is from page 426 of the late Jan Tumlir’s January 1984 speech at the Cato Institute – a speech titled “Economic Policy for a Stable World Order” – as this speech is reprinted in Dollars, Deficits, & Trade (James A. Dorn and William A. Niskanen, eds., 1989):
Indeed the difficulty for the economist may now lie in explaining why the world economy still functions at all, however dissatisfied we may be with its functioning. The answer is, of course, that there is a lot of ruin in any economy with a modicum of freedom. I am sometimes unsure whether it is actually an advantage of the capitalist system that it can take such an enormous amount of beating. If it were in the habit of collapsing more frequently, we would perhaps govern ourselves more prudently (and more cheaply to boot).
DBx: Indeed.
I’ve long argued that the economist’s standard assertion that government intervenes into the economy first and foremost to correct market failures fails spectacularly as a positive theory of government intervention into the economy. It’s far closer to the truth to say that government intervention into the economy is fueled not by market failures (as understood by economists) but, rather by the market’s astonishing success and robustness.
The market’s success at raising people’s standards of living creates the expectation that wealth creation is easy and normal while poverty is out of the ordinary. But of course historically poverty is the norm – and poverty so deep, unrelenting, and overwhelming that few Americans today can begin to imagine a condition so crushing. Because the market makes wealth so abundant and its production appear to be normal and easy to the point of being practically automatic – and because nearly all of the massive number of details of the intricate processes at work at every moment to create wealth are hidden from view – the market’s ‘failure’ to create heaven on earth is believed by many to be an unanswerable indictment of the market.
On top of this ‘problem’ is the market’s mighty robustness: tax it, saddle it with diktats, poison it with easy money, accuse it of being run by and for demons and devils, and the market keeps motoring along, improving the lives even of those who most hate it and who do the most to harass it. The market works less well than it would absent these intrusions, of course, but it still works surprisingly well. As long as, and insofar as, prices and wages are allowed to adjust according to the forces of supply and demand, the market’s robustness is Herculean. (The market is not, however, indestructible. Harass it too much and it will quit working.)
If the market truly collapsed completely more often, giving people a taste of what life is like without it, the world would have in it not only far fewer communists and socialists, but also far fewer “Progressives” and “conservative nationalists.”
The market’s true failure, in short, lies is its incredible capacity to succeed and to keep on keeping on. The market fails to prevent people from taking it for granted.
