Quotation of the Day…

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… is from page 118 of GMU Econ alum Howard Baetjer’s excellent 2017 book, Economics and Free Markets: An Introduction [footnote deleted; link added]:

Freely determined market prices are society’s essential means of communicating the vastly dispersed and ever-changing “knowledge of the particular circumstances of time and place.” We should free all our markets from price controls of any kind because we need market prices to give us this essential information in order to coordinate our various activities. Prices tell us what to do, or how to do it, by telling us indirectly what others know and what they are doing. Prices communicate to all, in a manner usable by all, the dispersed knowledge of all. Without market prices, we would face chaos and poverty. With market prices, we cooperate, coordinate our infinitely varied purposes, and prosper.