THIS comment from National Review's Jonah Goldberg has provoked a lot of blogospheric response:

The cult of experts has acolytes in all ideological camps, but its most institutionalized following is on the left. The left needs to believe in the authority of experts because without that authority, almost no economic intervention can be justified. If you concede that you have no idea whether your remedy will work, it's going to be hard to sell it to the patient. Market-based ideologies don't have that problem because markets expect events in ways experts never can.

This is what you might call a faith-based understanding of markets. That is, Mr Goldberg doesn't seem to get what it is that markets actually do.

When a company is developing a new product, its employees don't stroll over to the boss' office, grab the market magic wand, and create something that will sell profitably. The company turns to experts. Statisticians pore over market data, highly trained engineers develop the product and the means to produce it, and skilled accountants balance the books. Petrol doesn't find its way to Mr Goldberg's automobile thanks to pixie dust. Exxon employs scores of geologists, engineers, chemists, and managers. Expertise is critical in the function of a large, complex economy. Markets work by aggregating massive amounts of knowledge; it's the markets efficiency in processing expertise that makes it such a useful tool.

Just as importantly, markets reward expertise handsomely. Unemployment rates fall and compensation rises as one obtains more education. Holders of advanced degrees do best in the labour market. Mr Goldberg may not value expertise, but markets do.

That doesn't mean, of course, that we should turn over governance of a country and its economy to a Council of Learned Citizens. It does mean, however, that when elected officials are carrying out the important business of government it is a very good idea for those officials to rely on the analysis of experts. It's what the market would do.