The Economist he argues that those who call price gouging laws “communist” are wrong. Three-quarters (at least) of the US states, whether they are governed by Democratic or Republican governments, have them on the books (“America’s Anti-Tariff Laws Are Too Little To Be Communist,” April 22, 2024). In my opinion, those who use the epithet in this instance are rather ignorant or sophisticated. Calling them clusters, however, is correct.
Communism is an ideology inspired by Marx that relies on collective choice as opposed to individual choice in the control of society. (The Chinese government has abandoned Marx but not collectivism, which is the corporate standard.) Any form of price control, including mild inflation and gradual deflation, is collectivism but not necessarily communism. Communism is just one type of collectivity.
There are other types of coalitions involving the right, which define many laws that impose prices in all American states, and one at the federal level — the Defense Production Act, which is often invoked by the federal government including during (expanded) Covid emergencies. On both the center-left and center-right sides of the mainstream political axis, devaluation laws are the expression of collectivism with a human face. Highly centralized regimes impose permanent, extensive, and arbitrary price controls.
In contrast to the variety of left-right alliances stands spontaneity—from classical libertarianism to the ideal of anarcho-capitalism—where individual choice has the right to coordinate a spontaneous or spontaneous social order and to define minimal ethics. One should not be afraid of the words “collectivism” and “individualism”: they describe another fundamental approach to political philosophy.
“Price reduction” should definitely include scare quotes. Your preferred producer or egg farmer is no more “expensive” than your expensive babysitter or your salary. Manufacturers are happy to accept a price bid by customers and the latter are happy to receive a price reduction by competing suppliers. Buyers are happy to bid up prices for what they want instead of walking away without it. Many suppliers are willing to accept lower prices than leave the industry. No one is forced to accept a price offer, while everyone is forced to accept government interference in their lives for fear of punishment. Market-determined prices serve to coordinate individual actions without being coerced by authorities. Nothing is perfect but voluntary cooperation by private choice is often preferred to restrictions and obligations imposed by force.
Anthony de Jasay was a dissident economist and political philosopher who described himself as both a (classical) liberal and an anarchist. He expressed an important difference between collective (collective options) and individual choice (individual choice) by defining freedom as the ultimate value; quoting from his book Social Contract, Free Ride):
Freedom … implies a broad discretion to decide each and every matter whose framework lends itself, with almost incomparable ease, to both individual and collective choice.
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