We do not expect or want elitists and moral supremacists who believe that they know so much more about justice, the market, and how we should live. In his recent book Intellectuals and Society, Thomas Sowell explains how the "anointed" believe that their advanced education and depth of knowledge in one field automatically makes them an authority on any field in which they wield an opinion. Thus Noam Chomsky, a noted scholar in linguistics, has written dozens of books condemning America's and Israel's foreign policy with only the illusion of authority.
Sowell further explains that the most educated among us know only the smallest fraction of what is to be known. That these highly educated people may know so much more than any one of us does not mean that they know a fraction as much as do all of us.
I know the price of a Visconti fountain pen, an Ibanez George Benson Model guitar, an Acer 9" laptop, a subscription to Netflix, a ton of carbon steel, a Ford Expedition, a flight to St. Kitts, a forklift, a Rocky Patel cigar, a bottle of Glenrothes scotch, and an hour of time for a decent electrician. My expertise on these items combined with the market experience and expertise of millions of others is what constitutes a free market. It is how the prices of millions of items are accurately determined and how assets are allocated to production.
When prices are determined by central planning or anointed experts, shortages and gluts appear. The failed economies of the old Soviet Union and other systems determined by elite central planning evidences the flaw of thinking that elites know more than the combined individuals that comprise a healthy market.
But this flaw of elitist thinking and planning is not limited to market pricing.
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