There is no such thing as a free market – they are always set up to serve particular interest groups, writes Dr Tony Brauer
In your editorial on inflation (18 May), you call for “a reckoning for a free market ideology that has come to dominate our political life”. I agree, except that there is no such thing as a free market. All markets are structured to serve the interests of particular interest groups, and rarely for the common wealth.
Nor should ideologues such as Boris Johnson be allowed to blame these crises on global systems. The systems didn’t just pop into existence; they have been constructed from a particular vision of global capitalism. Johnson and his ilk created the conditions from which low productivity, increasing inequality, and inflation have emerged. Further, there are plausible arguments that the global capitalist system is a good breeding ground for international pandemics, xenophobic nationalism and economic and military imperialism.
