Markets can be messy. They are chaotic. A free-market economy consists of millions of people making trillions of decisions, every day, every one of which is in one way or an economic decision, whether that decision is to buy a candy bar, a house – or a tank of gasoline. All of those decisions involve tradeoffs, which is why a politician will ask you, “What do you want?” But an economist will ask you, “What do you want more?”
Markets also, if left alone, usually get things right in the end. For folks who know this, it’s frustrating to see politicians, like, say, the impeccably coiffed Governor Gavin Newsom of California, proposing that the state meddle in things he knows nothing about. He’s pushing a new requirement that gas and oil companies should be subjected to a minimum storage requirement to avoid shortages and the concomitant price spikes. Chevron executive Andy Walz is…
