I would describe myself as cautiously pro market, but I think it's hard to deny that they are effective externality seeking machines. If there is any way of providing a benefit while finding a way to impose the cost diffusely, you can bet that the market will find it. Market based systems guarantee that costs will be hidden and imposed on those who don't receive the benefit to the maximum extent possible given physics and law.
On top of that, it's interesting that we only use the market concept at the meta level. Vanishingly few of the businesses that compete in the marketplace are internally arranged on market principles. Instead they follow bureaucratic and oligarchic principles internally. And when the survival of the state is on the line because of war, we don't trust markets to allocate resources to get important things built quickly - rather the state takes power to directly cause some things to be built and other things not to be.
Although the market gets praised for being good at allocation of capital, I would say it's good in the way evolution is good at finding things that can survive. It might find great solutions that a planned process wouldn't, but it'll take a long time and a lot of things will die in the process.
On top of that, it's interesting that we only use the market concept at the meta level. Vanishingly few of the businesses that compete in the marketplace are internally arranged on market principles. Instead they follow bureaucratic and oligarchic principles internally. And when the survival of the state is on the line because of war, we don't trust markets to allocate resources to get important things built quickly - rather the state takes power to directly cause some things to be built and other things not to be.
Although the market gets praised for being good at allocation of capital, I would say it's good in the way evolution is good at finding things that can survive. It might find great solutions that a planned process wouldn't, but it'll take a long time and a lot of things will die in the process.