The Market is a Harlot

It's not just the rich who benefit from free markets

"In an unhampered, free-market economy, the distribution of income is wholly determined by the interplay of mutually beneficial market transactions between sellers and buyers.

Incomes are attained by selling goods and services to customers willing to pay for them, and suppliers who most closely meet the needs and desires of consumers are rewarded with revenues that more than cover production costs.

The resultant inequality, therefore, derives from the personal choices of the millions, or even billions, of participants in the market process"

This sort of absurd oversimplification is particularly prevalent in the pseudo-science of economics and always results in a false argument which creates a myth which in turn bolsters and recreates the status quo.

Firstly, an 'unhampered, free-market economy' is a contradiction-in-terms and an utter impossibility in the context of human interactions. The vested interests 'hamper' the market for their own benefit every day through the election and manipulation of their drones in government.

Secondly, I can think of a number of significant sources of income which have nothing to do with the selling of goods and services, not to mention the common goods which are shared and used by everyone free of charge, and therefore have no value according to this outdated oversimplified model.

I could go through this whole article and pick it to pieces, but you get the drift. The starting point is absurd so all that derives from it is also absurd.

So the title is true in an absurd sort of a way. It might more accurately be read as 'be happy and satisfied with the few crumbs which fall to you as we devour this crust of bread'.

There are way too many right-wing neo-liberal free-market extremists spreading this sort of drivel around and not enough realists to counter their absurd arguments. Even if there were sufficient numbers though, they would never make it into circulation to the major portion of the electorate because these people get their information from the mainstream media, and these are controlled by the vested interests who benefit from everyone believing this crap. If you say it enough times any lie becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. Thus are the myths created which procreate the present reality and doom us to repeat the mistakes of the past.

But enough of this morbidity. Since the market is a harlot let's go have a bang.