A short observation on the myth of the 'Free Market'

Though quite sometime has elapsed, it may not be entirely untimely to reproduce here a brief compliment one of my Nirmukta pals, Arvind Iyer proffered for my 'belated prescience' on the outcome and endgame for the current version of capitalism at play in most parts of the developed world

"Your warnings about free-market fundamentalism may not be that unfounded after all. People have already taken to the streets.

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/10/01/business/wall-street-protests/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

"Here's Michael Moore on what went wrong with capitalism. I think he's spot on."

http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/bestoftv/2011/09/26/piers-michael-moore-capitalism.cnn?hpt=hp_t1

 To which I kindly acknowledged the point and responded in these lines:


First of all there is no free market anywhere, whether now or in the past. 

When everything 'appears' to work fine in the economy, 'free market advocacy' claims all or most credit for it. As cyclical and/or structural corrections start setting in the economy, as it invariably happens most of the time, these very same ideologues start crying foul, blaming everything from the govt., socialism, regulation, irrational panic, market psychology et al. 

Everything except their own irrationality and lack of critical thinking skills!!. 

Here is one such churlish response below to Micheal Moore's attack on the flaws of capitalist styles in currency today

http://business.nd.edu/ask_more/commentary.aspx?id=4649


The few free-market critics were also once admirers of that style of economic approach and organization. Economists like Nouriel Roubini, Stephen Roach, Joseph Stiglitz, Steve Keen seem to be quite balanced and very acute observers of prevailing and changing trends in the global system and not fixated to a collection of  typical capitalist maxims.

Hyman Minsky was another recent economist of note who studied the inherent instability of capitalism. Karl Marx was of course one of the earliest and perhaphs the best critic of the excesses and flaws of free-for-all capitalism. But he got crucified because his alternative economic prescription famoulsly failed.

What most people fail to see is that communism or extreme forms of socialism fails for almost  the same reasons as that of capitalism. 

Because intellectual aristocracy of the world has an  inherent bais towards free market ideology and that ideology has an intuitive feel and pleasing tone about it and best serves the vested interests of economic elite, its bugles and bells always ring the loudest.