Adam Smith is often called the father of economics. His famous book, The Wealth of Nations, talks about an “invisible hand” which automatically allocates goods to the persons most able to put them to good use. The invisible hand operates through the price mechanism for goods and services, so that individuals who trade on the market, while seeking only their own good, are actually efficiently allocating society’s resources.
His ideas, if applied to modern capital markets, imply that these markets would efficiently allocate investment capital to the firms that would use the capital most efficiently in producing goods and services for society. But this would happen only if markets were left to operate without state intervention.
Do you think modern governments should leave capital markets unregulated? Why or why not?