People Are Not Victims or Puppets: The Anti-Liberal Critique Lets People off the Hook for Their Choices

To put it mildly, economic liberalism is not in vogue.

In the United States, the energy in the Democratic Party is with self-described socialists who reject free markets and support, say, government-owned grocery stores. On the right, Vice President JD Vance argues that economic growth is overrated, that economic science might be “fake,” and that the bipartisan liberal consensus on economic policy has “failed” for the last four decades. Attacks on economic liberalism are increasingly common from think tanks, commentators, and economists, as well.

Critics argue that liberalism has not delivered broad-based prosperity — an attack that can be convincingly defended against in the comfortable language of statistics and quantitative analysis. But their critique goes further, asserting that liberalism is morally corrosive. This critique, too, is off base.

On the former, just a few facts and calculations: The free enterprise system has delivered employment opportunities and rising wages, living standards, and wealth. The rate at which people ages 25 to 54 participate in the workforce is currently higher than it was at the onset of the 2008 financial crisis or the Covid-19 pandemic. Adjusted for inflation, the average wages for nonsupervisory workers has increased by 41 percent over the last three decades. Real median household income grew by 39 percent from 1994 to 2024, the most recent year data are available.

Real household income for the bottom 20 percent increased by 80 percent from 1990 to 2022 (the last year data are available), after adjusting for inflation, taxes, and transfer payments. The inflation-adjusted wealth of families in the bottom 25 percent tripled from 1989 to 2022, the last year data are available. On a consumption basis, well over 20 percent of households were in poverty in the 1960s, compared to 1 percent today.

I tackle the latter in my latest Financial Times column:

For one, economic liberty is intrinsically valuable.

Also, the free enterprise system pushes against the problematic tendency in American life to see people less as individuals and more as members of a group. The system is premised on the idea that society should accept the preferences, knowledge and decisions of individuals and families.

This system argues that the welfare of society should be measured not by hazy perceptions of national greatness or by progress towards objectives set by elites, but instead by how well off individuals and families are — in their capacity as individuals and families.

Work is itself of great moral value. It offers a sense of identity and purpose, directs our energy and time to productive ends, and allows us to provide for our families. It offers spiritual benefits, as well, because it is inherently creative. Pope John Paul II argued that in carrying out the biblical mandate “to subdue, to dominate, the earth”, every person “reflects the very action of the Creator of the universe”.

I offer other arguments, which I’d encourage you to check out.

Still, there is something to the anti-liberal critique. But one of its key flaws is that it lets individuals off the hook:

People are not puppets responding to the string pulls of market forces. We have agency. The market may value my taking a consulting project over spending time with my family, for example. But that doesn’t mean I have to take the project — the choice is mine to make.

Liberalism gives pride of place to liberty. But liberty is not the same as licence. To let your passions — or market incentives — determine your choices is to be enslaved. Instead, liberty must be ordered to notions of truth, human flourishing and the good life. As John Paul II argued, “freedom itself needs to be set free.” Free markets require a virtuous citizenry to prevent society from decomposing.

The challenge for liberals is to live liberty well. The anti-liberals have it exactly backwards: the problems facing a market society do not come primarily from markets — they come from society.