It’s thrust is that free markets are good, but need to be regulated by the government to make them fair. I disagree with many of its conclusions, but I did appreciate the numerous examples of regulatory overreach the author provided to show how it can be taken too far. The sections on trucking and the airline industry were particularly illuminating.
For example, airline companies were licensed by 1938 and no other airlines were allowed to be created until deregulation in the Carter administration. Airlines (and many other industries) would go hat-in-hand to regulators begging them to solve all of their problems - prices, competition, union issues, and on and on. As intra-state flying wasn’t regulated by the feds but inter-state was, it became cheaper to fly within a state by over 50% than if you crossed a state border.
As a recent example, I read this book “The Economist’s Hour” which is a left-wing critique of free markets https://www.amazon.com/Economists-Hour-Prophets-Markets-Frac...
It’s thrust is that free markets are good, but need to be regulated by the government to make them fair. I disagree with many of its conclusions, but I did appreciate the numerous examples of regulatory overreach the author provided to show how it can be taken too far. The sections on trucking and the airline industry were particularly illuminating.
For example, airline companies were licensed by 1938 and no other airlines were allowed to be created until deregulation in the Carter administration. Airlines (and many other industries) would go hat-in-hand to regulators begging them to solve all of their problems - prices, competition, union issues, and on and on. As intra-state flying wasn’t regulated by the feds but inter-state was, it became cheaper to fly within a state by over 50% than if you crossed a state border.