This is important and one of the major reasons following an unsustainable model got us in such economic trouble. Having said that, there are lots of shades of gray when you dip your toe into defining a free market economy, but basically we’re talking about supply and demand—you need shoes, I make shoes; you need a car, I make cars. And that worked pretty well for centuries in the American economy, experiencing a little over-supply at times and minor shortages at others, but it generally evened itself out. We had a healthy, productive nation, a solid middle class and our kids went off to school with the assurance there would be a job somewhere in a normal, competitive job market.