Michael Munger on Free Markets

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4.7 • 4.3K Ratings

🗓️ 9 August 2021

⏱️ 70 minutes

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Summary

Author and economist Michael Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the virtues--and the flaws--of free markets. Munger says the best argument for a free market approach is not that it's perfect but that it's better than anything else we've been able to come up with over the centuries. Better at bringing people out of poverty, better at promoting wealth creation, and better at pushing up the standard of living for most of the people, most of the time. Topics include what exactly is a free market, why specialization is so important, the case for case-by-case intervention, and the challenge of picking the prettiest pig.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, Conversations for the Curious, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:07.8	I'm your host, Russ Roberts of Shalem College in Jerusalem and Stanford University's Hoover
0:12.6	Institution. Go to econtalk.org where you can subscribe, comment on this episode and
0:17.8	find links down there information related to today's conversation. You'll also find our archives,
0:23.2	but every episode we've done going back to 2006. Our email address is mail at econtalk.org. We'd
0:30.3	love to hear from you. Today is July 26, 2021 and my guest is economist and author, Michael Munger.
0:45.1	He was last year in March talking about desires, morality and self-interest. This is Mike's 39th
0:51.4	appearance on econtalk and what will be I think our 801st episode, more or less. So that's almost
0:58.7	5%, roughly 5%, we could put a decimal pointer to and there for listeners and entertainment.
1:04.2	It's a little scary, Mike, but I've enjoyed every one of them and our listeners have too.
1:09.4	I want to thank Plantronics for providing today's guest with the Plantronics 5220 headset.
1:13.7	Mike, welcome back to econtalk. It is great to be back. Our topic for today is unease with free markets.
1:25.9	A topic suggested by a listener who likes free markets but doesn't like sometimes what comes
1:30.8	with them, some of the outcomes and results and is an easy being a free marketer. So I thought we'd
1:35.8	start off by talking about what do you mean if you describe yourself as a free market or what is a
1:41.9	free market near view? If I describe myself as a free market person, then I am a believer that
1:52.0	increases in wealth and prosperity and reductions in poverty come about as a result of elaborating
1:58.1	division of labor. So when students take my class, I get them by the end to be able to respond
2:06.4	very quickly to the question, what's the argument for markets? Is it the perfection of markets?
2:11.1	No, it is that division of labor is a way of fostering specialization. Now there are many institutions
2:20.1	that can foster specialization. There was division of labor in Farronik, Egypt.
2:26.1	There was so very substantial. In fact, we see the legacy of that. My name is Monger. That is
	...

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