Do you think commerce (i.e- the free market)is helpful to people having happy lives?

Question

Or do you think it's a way toward misery and economic slavery?

Answer 1

Karl Marx said it was misery and economic slavery.  He preferred communism.  It's weird that communism was the thing that created the most misery and economic slavery.  Commerce was much better. /

Answer 2

What it definitely does for sure is raise the economic standard of living for people all over the world. Whether that makes your life happier is less certain. Research tends to suggest that the effect is inversely related to what your living standard was before -- i.e. more economic prosperity seems to increase happiness most among those who had less to begin with than it does among those who had more.