&gt; the system rapidly compensates and settles on a price that implies a number of people value it at that price.<p>I think this is not true.  The system <i>tries</i> to settle on a price that implies a sufficient number of people value it at more than that price.  Yet, the system ejects players (business failure) which means that the price&#x2F;market was not accurately gauged (either too high or too low).  And this process of ejection is very slow.  Price discovery is not an efficient process, and I think Hayek&#x27;s information problem applies to free markets &quot;only slightly less than&quot; it applies to governments.<p>In short, markets are not efficient, nor is there really much good evidence that they should be, just a belief.<p>&gt; value is also subjective<p>Yes, it is.  And that is exactly the reason why even your weak statement &quot;a number of people value it at least that price&quot; - is far far weaker than the OP&#x27;s statement that markets approximate some representation of social value.<p>I&#x27;m personally a staunch defender of free markets, but my defense is not based on effectiveness of markets in organizing society, rather that centralized clearance of value backed by a state entity is an unacceptable and discriminatory marginalization of dissenting value opinions backed by the rod of state enforcement.