The newspaper lay on his table. Yes, he still got the newspaper. I sipped my coffee and read the headline: Another soccer player dies of cardiac arrest.
“I’ve heard a lot about this lately. It’s weird that it’s happening so much. What is going on?”
“Near the end of the article it mentions that he had the vaccine shot four days ago.”
“Do you think that’s what caused it.”
Bob shrugged his shoulders. “We will never know.”
“Anyway, I read that the pharmaceutical companies don’t have any liability with the vaccine. Before this there were the big banking institutions that got propped up by the government. No one went to jail with all of their bad loans and predatory lending they did.” I shook my head. “People talk about the free market like it’s such a great thing. Maybe it isn’t.” I wasn’t pleased. In fact, I was downright mad. “The little guy always suffers at the expense of the big company fat cats.”
Bob rubbed his forehead. He didn’t give me that half smile like he usually would. I think he looked a bit annoyed. “That has nothing to do with a free market. In a free market, there would be consequences for poor outcomes for a bad service or product. That isn’t the market.” Bob brought the cup of coffee to his lips and sipped the coffee. “When you go to the grocery store and there are three of ten lanes open, people are waiting five deep in each lane. Then two cashiers open two more lanes, the people closest, and more than likely at the back of those lines swoop in to be the first at those two open spots. That’s how a free market works on a small scale. Those other lanes opening are like competition to other struggling checkout lanes.”
I wasn’t seeing it. I’m sure I looked puzzled. “How is that like the free market?”
Bob paused. I could tell he was searching for the words to make his point. “People will gravitate to what is the best option when more options are presented to them. Then, in the case of lanes in a grocery store, most of the people are better than they were prior to having less options.”
“What do you mean most people?”
“Well, the people still in the original lanes didn’t improve their situation, but.” He raised his pointer finger in the air to emphasize his next point. “The overall situation improved.”
I sat there and thought about what Bob just said. The overall situation improving but not everyone’s situation. “For those people that are now at the back of the line of the original…are they a metaphor for the people who don’t make it and are the stories that are reported on by the media?”
Bob nodded his head. “The other thing that happens to those waiting at the back of the original lines, a couple of them will be scanning the other lanes and take advantage of a better circumstance.”
“Are those the people whose lives are improved by the free market but otherwise would’ve not been able to take advantage of more options. What about the others? The ones still at the end of the original lanes.”
“Those are the people the media talks about.”
That example started to shed some light on a market working. The room grew quiet, the only thing heard was the ticking of the clock on the far wall. Bob didn’t have anything further to add and I searched for another example that further solidified Bob’s example. I thought about the internet. That was a free market, or at I think it is but it’s so big I wasn’t sure if it fit with Bob’s example. “TV shows.” Bob glanced at me and then my cup, noticed I was out of coffee so he poured coffee into my cup until I placed my hand near the top of the cup. “TV shows. They’re like your example of the free market with grocery store shopping lanes.”
“How so?”
Bob had a very old tv that you changed channels by turning a knob. “At one time I thought that TV shows had seen their golden age. Network TV had grown stale. The networks had turned their attention to reality tv. Probably because they were relatively cheap and easy to make. Not too long ago the phenomenon of streaming TV grew. Netflix, Apple TV+, Disney+, Hulu and probably a bunch more that I’m not thinking of right now. They opened up just an amazing array of new shows. Some aren’t that good but others are great. It created more lanes, probably different kind of lanes, sort of like the self-checkout lanes at the grocery store.” I was excited. I found a real world example.
“Sounds similar. I don’t like those self-checkout lanes though.” He smiled.
“Me neither.” I sat a little while again. Letting my mind ponder that. “So the difference between these examples and the banks or pharmaceutical companies is that they get an implicit guarantee.”
“Yes. In a free market there is natural consequences for a poor product or service.”
“Failure.”
“Yes. Failure or stagnation.” He shrugged his shoulders. “You get a better outcome”
“Would this work for the medical field and education.”
“The free market would improve any area.”
I rested my back on the chair, and let what he said sink in. I knew I would think about it when I went to use services, especially services that don’t have a free market or much of one.
