You're hitting on one of the important facts that both supporters and detractors of economic liberty often get wrong.
When people think "free markets", they think "competition". And competition is one important ingredient. But it misses the fact that 99% of what goes on in a market is not competition, but cooperation.
Too many supporters of free markets put forward a caricature of independence. The whole reason markets work so well is that we're all so dependent on each other -- if we were all self-reliant little islands we wouldn't need markets, or we wouldn't have the incentives to play well within them.
And too many detractors of free markets deny their cooperative nature entirely, and assume that only non-commercial activity can truly be cooperative, morally pure, or beneficial to society as a whole.
When people think "free markets", they think "competition". And competition is one important ingredient. But it misses the fact that 99% of what goes on in a market is not competition, but cooperation.
Too many supporters of free markets put forward a caricature of independence. The whole reason markets work so well is that we're all so dependent on each other -- if we were all self-reliant little islands we wouldn't need markets, or we wouldn't have the incentives to play well within them.
And too many detractors of free markets deny their cooperative nature entirely, and assume that only non-commercial activity can truly be cooperative, morally pure, or beneficial to society as a whole.