The Morality of Markets

Abstract

Scholars and civil society have argued that competition erodes supplier morality. This paper establishes a robust irrelevance result, whereby intense market competition does not crowd out consequentialist ethics; it thereby issues a strong warning against the wholesale moral condemnation of markets and procompetitive institutions. Intense competition, while not altering the behavior of profitable suppliers, may, however, reduce the standards of highly ethical suppliers or not-for-profits, raising the potential need to protect the latter in the marketplace.