It is the state’s intervention in the market that gives political power to the ruling minority and restricts in innumerable ways the development and progress of society, not least at an individual level. The majority can thus only have more influence over the direction of society through a limitation of this political power. An increase in freedom (i.e. more voluntary and unforced exchange) thus requires the reduction of state power over society.

The free market is the only social order that is based on popular sovereignty understood as the right to choose. Only the free-market economy allows the choices of millions of individuals to be considered—not once every few years at the ballot boxes—but every day, countless times a day for each individual. As Mises wrote, “Capitalism is the consummation of the self-determination of the consumers.” Real democracy can thus only exist in the free market.