Editor’s Note: the blog post’s title is a reference to the (un)official mantra of Sunshine Review, a wiki which supports government transparency and exposes corruption/incompetence.

In a span of 6 hours, I have been intellectually and financially ravaged. The very underpinnings of a free-market economy have been challenged. Not once, but twice!

First, I swung by the local dry cleaners to clean 5 shirts and 3 pants. I looked around the store for a price list, and it wasn’t posted anywhere. In all honesty, I should have asked for a price sheet, but I was in a hurry and there wasn’t a cleaners within a mile of my residence (I don’t have a car and didn’t feel like walking 10-15 minutes at 7:30 AM). I figured the price couldn’t be that high. So I instinctively pull out a $20 as I’m being rung up (a shirt is usually $1 and I guessed pants would be $3). The grand total? $32! I had to spend $32 to dry clean 5 shirts and 3 pants.

Later in the day, I stopped by Jimmy John’s (a great subs place in the Chicagoland area) for lunch. I peruse the menu and settle for a tuna salad sub. While I’m ordering, the nice employee asks, “Would you like cheese?”. I respond “sure”. Like any red-blooded American, I occasionally prefer my sandwiches to include thin slices of processed and/or enzymed dairy products.

She rings me up for a price that I thought was a bit high. Only when I returned to the office to enjoy the sandwich did I think to check the receipt. That Jimmy John’s Jezebel (J-cubed, for short) charged me an additional $.99 for 2 slices of cheese! Did she ever tell me that cheese would cost extra? No. She offered cheese as casually as she took my hard-earned money.

I, PragmaticallyPolitical, got fooled twice.

To this end, I do accept some responsibility for being overcharged (twice!). I should have asked prices more clearly. One of the central notions of liberal economic thought, and libertarian political thought, is that no one is more careful with his/her own welfare than the individual.

Aside from being slightly humorous, what do these tales tell us? I offer to you that the United States economy is ill-prepared for capitalism. Though I am not an unconditional, raging free-marketeer, I do believe that the private sector best provides for society’s wants and needs. The government can handle roads, defense, basic welfare issues, and legal enforcement. The free market gets pretty much everything else. Yet, if we are at a point where prices need not be posted and extra changes can mysteriously appear on bills, then we have some work to do. The consumer must always be offered sufficient information to make a reasoned, rational decision.

The problem of ignorance extends from economics and into politics. We often fail to ask the hard questions of the candidates they support. Bob Barr supporters shy away from addressing Barr’s electability and potential role as electoral spoiler. McCainiacs don’t want to talk about McCain’s age or curmudgeonly appearance. Obamaniacs would sooner vote for McCain than actually talk about the issues…let alone name a single legislative accomplishment Obama has made in 3 years on the Senate floor. Candidates offer unbalanced budgets and corporate loopholes with a cheese-ier smile than J-cubed gave me. They hide the prices (social, political, and economic) of their platforms and hope you’ll go along with it because they present a good image, use the right buzzwords, and are a member of the right party. Usually, it works.

Consumers: be more prudent and ask more questions. It is the only way you can maximize your happiness and make the best possible choices.

Producers: help us out and be more overt. Once you lose the trust of the market, you cannot get it back. I doubt I shall ever return to that dreaded cleaners on Noyes Street and now will gladly walk a mile and return to my old trusted friends, BC Cleaners. Meanwhile, J cubed makes me want to avoid Jimmy John’s more than Barack Obama avoids talking about the issues (SLAM!).

Thinking: it’s pragmatic.

Roger Daltrey: solving free-market economics in a limited-information environment since 1964!