It must be nice to live in a fairy tale world where some simple idea, like "freedom" just fixes everything. In the sunshiny world of "Sheldon Richman", the economic bailout of 2008 was just politicians making it seem like they weren't doing nothing. I don't know about you, but if our economic system had ground to a halt, it would have inconvenienced me.
What would economic collapse have meant? How about your debit cards and credit cards not working… How about gas stations not being able to get supplies of fuel… How about grocery stores not being able to pay for shipments of food… How long could you go without needing to buy something, before life got really uncomfortable.
Luckily, because we have government, the economy is not purely a zero-sum game. The government *can* create money when the system starts to freeze up. When the "free market" collapsed, the government was able, through swift action, to keep most of it afloat, so that, although there was a huge dislocation, the whole sucker didn't just come down.
- Steven D. Brewer's blog
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