Plutoyperetonism in its Proper Place

A reader with the inattentive, fraternal, amorous yet equine name of Distracted Brony asks:

Mr. Wright,

I have learned a lot from your blog about the evils of socialism and other such wealth-redistribution ideologies. But I have not learned much about the possible corruptions and other problems of free-market systems.

It would be nice to hear about these things without having to go to a liberal site to do so. If you have any solid reading suggestions, or if you have written elsewhere on the subject, I would be pleased.

The comment flatters me beyond my merit. I am in no position to list the errors and drawbacks of the free-market and for this reason:

The problems are fraud and greed.

This has been known to all men since the dawn of time. What needs to be said of them?

The only thing to be said is that master can and do treat apprentices and employees badly, but that being a slave is even worse, because the employee is legally free to depart and seek another master. If the circumstances, for whatever reason, make the legal right difficult to exercise, enslaving the fellow do not alleviate such problems, but rather aggravate them.

You will have to seek elsewhere for your information. Since I have heard nothing but lies, horror stories, lies, criticisms, lies, nonsense, lies and lies about the free market since the time I was old enough to be propped up in front of a TV to watch THE FLINTSTONES, I am puzzled that you or anyone thinks there may be some criticism of the free market which has not yet been aired, discovered, trumpeted from the rooftops, refuted by sane economists in a paragraph or two, and, after being refuted, refuted again, triply refuted, and proven beyond any possible scintilla of a shadow of a doubt by a century or two of example and experience, the false belief goes on to become an ingrained and unshakeable core dogma of all Democrats and two thirds of the Republicans, and shows up in all the dramas and sitcoms and rock songs and half the news stories.

A man dying of thirst in the desert is not the right person to ask about the dangers of drowning in a teacup, not when you live in a culture where all the murder mysteries concern rich uncles found with mouth and nose jammed in teacups, with water in their lungs, and ninety percent of all public debates, laws, regulations, and court cases concern the manufacture, distributions, handling and filling of teacups so as to prevent accidental drowning.

Read the rest of this entry »

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.