How to Destroy Efficient Jobs

Exchange is the foundation of efficiency, including in jobs. A job is efficient when it embodies a series of exchanges that benefit all parties. The self-employed person, who creates his own job, directly sells something his customers want. A job holder sells his labor services to an employer who values them because this exchange allows the firm to sell at a profit something its customers want. The supplier of labor services, the supplier of goods produced with these labor services, and the purchasers of the final goods all benefit; otherwise, they would not engage in exchange. We would therefore expect that preventing any of these acts of exchange destroys efficient jobs. If a self-employed worker and his voluntary customers are prevented from exchanging, each loses what would otherwise have been his benefits from exchange. Similarly, if a worker and an employer are prevented from entering into a labor contract on terms on which they mutually agree, they both lose, and so will the consumers of the final products that are, or would have been, supplied by the employer.