In his Sept. 17 column “Capitalism and government are friends after all,” Alex Marshall argues that without government, markets cannot exist. He argues that roads, etc. lead to the creation of markets and capitalism.

This is becoming a mantra among those who would rather have the government be their father, mother and big brother combined into one: “fill out this form, and get a free lunch”; “let us tell you what you can watch and you can have free TV”; “here, let us regulate your caloric intake”; “privatized Social Security? You are too stupid to handle that on your own, let us take care of that for you.”

Capitalism and government are not friends after all, and this can easily be witnessed in any communist country. Places where more government exists have less economic freedom and less freedom as a whole. Yes, China is the world’s No. 2 economy, but how many Chinese citizens are forced to work in places where they slave 18 hours a day to make money that Americans could not live off of? But on the bright side, at least they have free health care, right?

The amount of children the Chinese can have is regulated, but their births are free.

One of the largest differences between communism and capitalism is that communism cannot exist without a large centralized government. Capitalism, however, only needs minimum — or possibly no — government intervention. Marshall is writing under the assumption that businesses are incapable of building means of transport, that businesses are incapable of protecting their own interests, and that businesses need intervention. The briefest skim of an article concerning the industrial revolution, or the briefest read into the early history of the railroad industry easily shows this claim to be a falsehood.