> There are no documented instances of a truly free market.
There's no such thing as pure water, either. Nor is there any person who has not had impure thoughts. Nor can you ever cut a board to an exact length. Nor has anything created by man (or nature) been perfect.
The historical reality is the more free a free market is, the better it performs.
A free market does not have to be a "truly free market" in order to deliver the goods.
>The historical reality is the more free a free market is, the better it performs.
Citation VERY MUCH needed. A free market leads to monopoly and abuse. It does not lead to competition, it does not lead to better long-term results, it leads to corruption, market capture, and oppression.
The United States, postwar Japan, postwar Germany, Hong Kong, Taiwan, S Korea, China, and so on.
How do you explain the scores of millions of people that came to the US, and still come, if the US free market is a hellhole of monopoly, abuse, corruption, and oppression?
The united states during its periods of greatest growth as well as the other environments you called out had strong regulatory environments to keep "the market" in check
I suspect you may be thinking that a free market is anarchy (no government). It isn't.
> The historical reality is the more free a free market is, the better it performs.
Performs for whom? The central idea of a free market is that is provides better goods and services and thus better outcomes for civilization. We have countless examples of innovations that have come through government intervention (internet, space grade goods and services, GPS, etc. just to name a few), so you simply cannot say in a deterministic way that a free market "performs better". This is simply NOT true.
FWIW - I'm a free market advocate, but I recognize markets and areas where externalities cannot be controlled for and thus require a centralized body to regulate.
> Performs for whom?
In the 19th century, the free market resulted in bootstrapping scores of millions of people up out of poverty into the middle class and beyond. The government was not involved in this.
> We have countless examples of innovations that have come through government intervention
We have far more from the free market. Have you ever looked at the number of patents?
As for the internet, that was simply a protocol. There were many other network protocols - Prodigy, RBBS, Bix, AOL, Ethernet, etc. Any time someone had two computers, they were connected with some form of network.
You're overlooking the grandaddy of networks - the telegraphy system. Yes, the first international binary network protocol. All later networks were based on ideas it pioneered. But somehow only the IP is valid?
Did you know that controled, powered flight came from the free market? Did you know that jet engines were developed thanks to funds from the free market, as the military saw no use for jet engines? The government did not get involved until they saw flying jet aircraft?
The free market also invented cars, bicycles, light bulbs, electric power generation utilities, telephones, circular saws, and on and on and on and on?
> I recognize markets and areas where externalities cannot be controlled for and thus require a centralized body to regulate
Externalities, such as pollution, are not free market, and are in the purview of government.
> In the 19th century, the free market resulted in bootstrapping scores of millions of people up out of poverty into the middle class and beyond. The government was not involved in this.
Did you know that the US railroad system was largely propped up by the US government during the 19th century, thus leading to the greatest exchange of goods and services across the whole of the US?
> Have you ever looked at the number of patents?
Did you even read the article?
Today, U.S. universities license 3,000 patents, 3,200 copyrights and 1,600 other licenses to technology startups and existing companies. Collectively, they spin out over 1,100 science-based startups each year, which lead to countless products and tens of thousands of new jobs. This university/government ecosystem became the blueprint for modern innovation ecosystems for other countries.
> Externalities, such as pollution, are not free market, and are in the purview of government.
You're proving my point yet again. If externalities are regulated ("purview of the government") then the good or service that is provided IS NOT REALLY A FREE MARKET. A truly free market would presume that any externality incurred would cause a subsequent good or service to be created to solve that externality.
You keep providing examples of the free market creating goods and services that are meaningful and beneficial as counter examples as to why they are better than government innovations. Yet, I am saying BOTH ARE IMPORTANT and one cannot unilaterally be true because we have cases on both side. In other words, it's not mutually exclusive, both can be true. Yet you continue to beat this drum that free market solves everything. Odd.
>Did you know that jet engines were developed thanks to funds from the free market, as the military saw no use for jet engines? The government did not get involved until they saw flying jet aircraft?
sigh At least try to look for examples that aren't so completely, utterly wrong. Which "flying jet aircraft" would that even be? The only one where you could even start to make that argument would be Heinkel's He178 prototype. Apart from the fact that it was explicitly designed to be monetized militarily...where do you think those funds came from in late 30s Germany, at one of the leading military plane manufacturers? (and please don't say Lufthansa...they didn't operate on a "free market" even since their inception in 26, and certainly not after 33).
You can't spell jet aircraft without military-industrial complex. Hell, even the first 707 family variant in service was a military one (KC-135).
Edit - almost overlooked that nugget:
>Externalities, such as pollution, are not free market, and are in the purview of government.
Ah yes, privatize profits, socialize costs. That kind of free market. I shouldn't have bothered.
It would be interesting to note how you define a free market in this context and what makes it “more free”.
Because a market can not be free unless there are rules and they are enforced.
Without rules and government intervention when necessary, what you get is the law of the jungle, which is precisely the thing the last 12000 years of human history has been about escaping.
A free market is not anarchy. It requires a government to protect rights, enforce contracts, and deal with externalities.
This is precisely my argument. A free market isn't really free if the government has to intervene in any form or manner. Per wikipedia:
Such markets, as modeled, operate without the intervention of government or any other external authority