Students of economics learn very early on in their studies that the fundamental problem in economics is the issue with scarce resources and unlimited wants. As such, economists deal with the optimum allocation of resources in society to ensure the efficient use of these resources. One way of achieving this efficient usage of resources is through the market mechanism, whereby supply and demand find an equilibrium point at a given price. The market mechanism is now seen as a panacea for most economic problems, and as the Maltese saying goes, “is-suq isuq” (the market is the driver). In the meantime, we have created a cruel and unkind economy, where, again according to the saying, the rule of the jungle applies. The free market has created more inequality and in order to reverse this inequality, we need to break the myth of the free market. One of the more famous quotations from A Christmas Carol of Charles Dickens is where Ebenezer Scrooge says: “If they would rather die, they had better do it and decrease the surplus population.” One cannot get much more cruel and unkind than that. In his very first apostolic exhortation, Pope Francis wrote that around the world today, the...