Market Regulation: Economic Markets & the Marketplace of Ideas

Ilya Somin has an interesting post at the Volokh Conspiracy asking how people reconcile favoring heavy regulation of economic markets while wanting a free market of culture and ideas, or the reverse, despite the cross-applicability of many arguements they make. The former position is that of many politically liberal economists, and the latter, that of free economic markets but heavy regulation of culture, is that of many on the political Right.

I find an Ayn Rand quote to be particularly apropriate here:

The conservatives see man as a body freely roaming the earth, building sand piles or factories–with an electronic computer inside his skull, controlled from Washington. The liberals see man as a soul free-wheeling to the farthest reaches of the universe–but wearing chains from nose to toes when he crosses the street to buy a loaf of bread.