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Richard Pitkin's avatar

I would like to comment on " One view, the one for which Hayek is famous, is that the market is the best judge of which technologies to develop. "

That is for the market to judge, there is a subtle expectation that the 'market' knows what it is judging. This is rather self evident with cars, radios, penicillin. I am not sure that with chemical pfsa, or social media attention algorithms. This asymmetry in knowledge makes it much more, if not impossible for the market/political body to make a fair judgement. I am reminded of Piketty's enjoiner to tax wealth, not for revenue, but to know where wealth is hidden, so that the information for policy decisions can be made. 

There is a tension behind this battle in that we need to accept management that is ongoing. While Americans prefer a checklist approach that allows monied interest over time to subvert the society. Or at least I see many instances of this in IRS policy, earned income taxes, brackets for taxing.

Oh well, nice column. 

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