OK, if Rand Simberg can write that he wants to ditch the label “capitalism” and replace it with free markets, I’m going to ask that we stop talking about competition in the free market and talk about customer choice instead. I think that choice is the better term because the only competition that helps is where the customer choice determines the winner. Customer choice free from restriction or coercion is really what we mean when we say free in free market. We need to get the focus off the company and on to the customer where it belongs. Sometimes people get the wrong idea with competition and think that if company A does something to hurt company B – like pay stores to not carry the other guys products, or spread false rumors – that is good because it is “competition”.
We’re really not interested with actions that reduce competition between firms in the market place, but with actions that reduce customer choice – and that includes government actions, not just company actions. When the customer isn’t free to choose, then the market isn’t really free, which is both economically inefficient and yes, morally wrong.
I’m going to harken back to my Hayek – who basically said a society should be built on private property, free markets, representative government, and the rule of law. And they really aren’t 4 separate things.
