In Mexico there’s a distributed network of mom-and-pop level shops, or tiendas. You can find one every three blocks or so—they’re like gas stations, stuffed with useful goods, and they do a good job of giving people most of what they need, most of the time.

They don’t really compete with each other in the same way that American businesses appear to, which begs the question of, why are they about the same level of quality in terms of customer service as a place like Wal-Mart?

My thought, put as simply as I can, is that most of the “consumer experience” benefits of capitalism happen when things are in flux. Once they’ve become stable, whether it’s a one-company monopoly type of stability, or a thousand-tiendas type of stability, things are going to wind up kind of mid. So we should think about what kind of mid we want.

I prefer the tiendas.