Deconstructing the Covid Vaccination Shell Game

This paper contrasts the smooth distribution of vaccinations for the annual flu against the contentious and clumsy distribution for vaccinations against Covid-19. I use this comparison to gain insight into the properties of markets and politics as vehicles for organizing human activity. The differing experiences with flu and Covid emerge as a straightforward implication of some sharp differences between market and political processes. In short, market processes promote rectitude among the participants and their transactions because those processes require agreement between buyers and sellers. In contrast, political processes are accompanied by rampant prevarication because those processes operate through forming coalitions, which leads those processes to resemble carnival shell games