… is from pages 101-102 of Thomas Sowell’s Compassion Versus Guilt, a 1987 collection of some of his popular essays; specifically, it’s from Sowell’s July 22nd, 1985, column titled “Lessons from Coca-Cola”:
The greatness of a competitive economy is that it forces constant revision of our estimates and changes in our behavior when we are mistaken. If we were omniscient, there would be no point in free enterprise or a competitive economy. Appointed officials could issue orders from on high to do the right thing, and that who be the end of it.
DBx: Yes.
Note that proponents of industrial policy implicitly believe that human beings who exercise government power are, if not omniscient, at least in possession of super-human intelligence and foresight.
