The Virtuous Purse Daily Reflection
Why Central Planning Always Fails
Central planners always imagine they can “do the math” better than millions of free people making their own voluntary choices. But economic calculation does not fail because the math is weak. It fails because without real prices, no one knows what people truly value.
You cannot guess what a family needs. You must listen; and the market is how people speak. Prices are information. They are the voice of the people, revealing what matters most, where, when, and to whom.
When the State replaces that voice with its own “expert” guesses, shelves go empty, resources are wasted, black markets explode, and the powerful feast while the poor starve.
A free market is not just efficient; it is humble, admitting that no single mind can command the wisdom of millions.
That is why freedom works and coercion never will.
Real World Examples:
Puerto Rico built massive government-funded housing complexes in the 90s because planners assumed people would live there. They ignored prices, ignored demand… and the buildings now sit abandoned and decaying — billions wasted — while private builders across the street quickly sold every home they built because consumers were actually choosing them.
Moscow had world-class scientists, statisticians, and central planners. What they didn’t have? Prices that reflected real demand. So the State ordered bread production based on ideology, not appetite. Result: mountains of stale bread rotted in warehouses
—while mothers stood in line for hours with nothing to feed their children. The math was flawless, but their understanding of economics was nonexistent.
Because the only person who knows how much bread a child needs… is the mother who feeds her.
In the United States, heavy regulations and artificial “affordability” policies distort the real cost of building and owning a home. Politicians cap rents, restrict land use, and flood markets with subsidized loans; all in the name of “helping.”
But when the State overrides the market:
- supply shrinks
- prices rise
- builders stop building
- families are priced out
The result?
What should be the natural fruit of a stable family — a home — becomes a luxury young families can barely dream of. Not because America lacks carpenters. But because the State refuses to let prices speak the truth.
thehearthofvirtue.com 