This video is a wondeful window into the complexity of one tiny market (delivery pizza) among millions of goods and services that trade hands every day. The complexity is staggering, all coordinated by the price mechanism ... supply and demand. And, yes, (the obligatory disclaimer for some of my readers) markets are not pefect and they are not apporpriate for every type of human exchange, but we massively underestimate the benefits that free markets bring to our lives. It is too massively complex to comprehend.
And, yes, I'm aware some will become fixated on the point that this example is using junk-food and will use that as a reason to dismiss it, but the point is that nearly ANYTHIING you buy has this complexity built in, right down to a #2 pencil or a paper clip. Markets will efficiently and inexpensively deliver everything from the noble to the ignoble. Markets are good in that they allow us to benefit from each other's productivity. But evil things will come from markets because markets are equally proficient at coordinating bad behavior. Free markets are vital to human flourishing but that does not imply that every market should be permitted nor that everything that emrges from market exchange is equally edifying.
Here is the YouTube setup:
"AMERICA REVEALED takes viewers on a journey high above the American landscape to reveal the country as never seen before. Join host Yul Kwon (Winner of "Survivor: Cook Islands") to learn how this machine feeds nearly 300 million Americans every day. Discover engineering marvels created by putting nature to work, and consider the toll our insatiable appetites take on our health and environment. Embark with Kwon on a trip that begins with a pizza delivery route in New York City, then goes across the country to California's Central Valley, where nearly 50 percent of America's fruits, nuts and vegetables are grown, and into the heartland for an aerial look at our farmlands. Meet the men and women who keep us fed - everyone from industrial to urban farmers, crop-dusting pilots to long-distance bee truckers, modern-day cowboys to the pizza deliveryman."
