[rflrob]

To tag on, the economy gives us more than just physical "stuff" (though that's one of the easiest things to measure). Do you enjoy travel? How about clean water, yoga classes, or therapy? What about the ability to post a message to complete strangers over the internet? As much as we could, in theory, do all of those things without having an economy to support it, money is a shockingly good way to give you whatever it is that you value.

Yes, some people have more money than they know what to do with (and, I would argue, than is good for them or us), but I've seen no reasonable suggestions that as many of us can have what we want without a reasonably open market economy. I don't think we're at a local optimum in the fine details of the rules for that economy, but I don't think moving to a whole different part of the possibility space is likely to be better than where we are now.