Jonah, the free market is, in itself, nothing more than a rather efficient (the best so far developed, in my view) way of allocating resources. If anything, as a recognition that no one person or institution can get things right, reliance upon it is both a welcome recognition of human imperfection and, at least in theory, a declaration of total moral neutrality. It’s a measuring device, no more judgemental than a set of scales. That said, you, I and some of your correspondents clearly believe that both the preconditions and the consequences of a functioning free market are beneficial in both material and non-material ways, but that’s a different topic…