The market has been the system through which different values came together and formed a compromise. A product’s worth is decided by its demand and supply, and is dealt with according to the value decreed upon it by the market. If a certain product is popular, its price goes up accordingly, and more effort and money are invested into making it. Such is the basic law of the market system. However, we are stumped to explain certain phenomena that do not follow the supply-and-demand model, and we are coming to realize the inherent limitations of this market system.

Ilchi Lee suggests that one of the underlying assumptions is that every person is informed fully and equally about the relevant information that could have a bearing on a certain product. However, we know that such an assumption is unrealistic. Even worse, a fatal flaw in the market system is that life’s most basic values are not “priceable” and therefore not available for transactions in a market. Our current market system is neither mature enough to deal with such values, honest enough to acknowledge that such values exist, nor detailed enough to transact such values.

There are cases in which a supplier does not participate in the market system for one reason or another and is prevented from being paid an equitable value for his products. There are also cases in which a transaction is not considered a transaction because of dishonesty or corruption. For example, if biodiversity is considered crucial to maintaining a stable ecosystem, what is the market value of a species? What about the market value of a clean environment, which everyone agrees is essential to the survival of the human species? What is the market value of a new global epistemology that will lead Earth into a healthy twenty-first century? What is the market value of salvation and immortality as promised in religions? How much would you pay for enlightenment.