A free market can produce some positive outcomes wherever you have multiple entities competing with each other. For all other tasks, it is the best to have the

A free market can produce some positive outcomes wherever you have multiple entities competing with each other. For all other tasks, it is the best to have the government handle the situation. The moment you find yourself saying "The free market can only fix this problem if the government first grants a monopoly to one of the participants" then you are really saying "This situation would be better handled by the government." This especially covers most research, where it is best to have the government do it.