Thanks, @trostparadox, for stopping by and responding :-) I'll briefly address your four principles, but you've left out the principle that ruins our daily lives; profits. All four principles develop in a certain direction if regarded in the light of the end goal of making profits; competition, for example, becomes elimination, power balance becomes power imbalance and free exchange becomes coercion. Here goes...

Competition: is good in sports, maybe even in trading goods and services that are not essential. In ALL other cases cooperation should be emphasized. So I largely disagree; see also "power balance" and "free exchange."

Power balance: is skewed as soon as the profit motive comes into play. Competition's first and foremost goal is to eliminate the competition. Through the process of elimination fewer and fewer "players" will controll an ever bigger piece of the market, leaving, for example, only 6 corporations that control all the world's media.

Free exchange: what is coercion? I hate to do it, but I'll refer you to the coconut-island parable; two people stranded on an island, one of which wakes up realizing that the other has collected all coconuts and there's no other food. If the coconut king only wants to share his coconuts if the other gives him a blow-job... Is that coercion? Or is it just live? Is it a "free exchange" of goods and services? Should there be a government on the island, is it its job to coerce the coconut king to share his coconuts? Do employers and employees live in a state of power-imbalance?

Alignment of incentives: ...? What is "overall societal well-being"? And what are the "adverse or misaligned incentives" you're thinking of?

Sorry for giving such a basic response with more questions than answers. I'm sure you've heard these arguments a million times before, and I'm curious, as a total amateur on the subject, what mechanism, sociological, political or economical would prevent the things I described happening. We know they did happen, so how should the system of free market capitalism be reformed to create a more equitable, fair and happy society?

I don't know when I'll be able to follow up on this, but I'm looking forward to your answers! Also, I should really visit your blog more often; I'm just now going to watch the interview you posted on April 6 about Big Tech and surveillance capitalism...

Once again: thanks for visiting!