Many politicians like to brag about how they will “defeat” high prices totally oblivious to the fact that prices are valuable messages from the free market. Add this to politicians’ propensity to think they know more than millions of people making free and voluntary decisions and it is a recipe for disaster. And their meddling in the market (attacking the messenger in the form of “prices”) almost always results in higher prices and less affordability.

Trump wants the state to own stakes in private business and to manipulate markets through tariffs. Mamdani is even worse.

It's no surprise that a self-declared socialist would want price controls to be a central part of his economic program. The conceit at the heart of socialism is that when it comes to the economy, politicians and bureaucrats know more than the rest of us. But prices, when they are allowed to work, are signals that provide valuable decentralized information. Price controls don't solve economic problems; they disguise them, making it harder to know what's happening. Prices are messages, and Mamdani wants to shoot the messenger.

Growth is the key to providing opportunity for all Americans. Ignoring market signals makes things worse. Entrepreneurs, skilled employees, and savvy consumers are much better at recognizing value than politicians. And diverting capital away from market makers rendering free and voluntary decisions based on value, into the hands of ignorant politicians just makes things worse.