Where does this conclusion come from?
I would intuitively define a free market, as a (virtual) place, where people can trade freely (goods or labour) without restrictions. And they profit, if they are better off with the trade, than without. The more free the market, the less restrictions.
Why so complicated?
But this is not reality. I doubt doing abstractions like these are helpful in understanding anything, when the base is so far off.
Profit is market inefficiency, whether due to missing information or inadequate competition. Perfect efficiency drives prices down to the marginal cost of a good or service. Micro 101 stuff.
No profit = no motive.
"perfect efficiency" means "no market" in this definition. It's a make believe process that will literally never happen. Companies that work with perfect efficiency close their doors.
These economic models are simplistic to the point of stupidity. But motivation to do the work can be totally priced in to the equations as a cost of doing business. Profit beyond that is what must, in the models, end up at zero to be efficient.
Individuals won't put up millions or billions to start large companies without a reason.
"models" remove human motivations and will never be realistic.
It's why Socialism and Communism are perfect on paper... but fail spectacularly in real life.
