Arguably, the economy just is. It has no purpose, other than what it does[0].
It's not like anyone designed it, or has any control over it. Some people are in position to make adjustments, nudge some aspect of it towards a desired goal or away from undesirable one, but there's only so much they can do - it's all strongly path-dependent.
Put another way, the shape of the economy is just an exercise of descending down the gradient. Any individual or group has very little control over this, and major changes to the economy basically only happen when war or technological inventions reshape the entire gradient.
It's not like anyone designed it, or has any control over it. Some people are in position to make adjustments, nudge some aspect of it towards a desired goal or away from undesirable one, but there's only so much they can do - it's all strongly path-dependent.
Put another way, the shape of the economy is just an exercise of descending down the gradient. Any individual or group has very little control over this, and major changes to the economy basically only happen when war or technological inventions reshape the entire gradient.
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[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_wha...