It might be that under theoretical conditions, free markets match up supply and demand in the long run, but as the famous economist John Maynard Keynes said: “in the long run we are all dead”. Even if a stable equilibrium is theoretically possible, in practice, it almost never happens, with high fluctuations in price, shortages and excesses as a consequence (A Tract on Monetary Reform, 2000).  An example of a market never reaching equilibrium is the so-called, empirically observed, ‘Pork Cycle’. When prices for pork meat are high, producers flock to the market. Since it takes a while, anywhere from months to over a year, to raise pigs before slaughter, prices will continue to rise and producers continue to join – until suddenly, the new supply reaches maturity and there is a sudden excess of pork meat on the market. This excess will then last for a longer period, since many producers are ‘locked in’, waiting for their pigs to mature. The same dynamics operate in the market for skilled labour, since getting the required vocational training also takes time.  Even if equilibrium is reached, the outcome isn’t necessarily fair. An example is the Irish Great Famine: due to circumstance and bad policy, potato supply in Ireland dropped dramatically. This caused prices to rise beyond the budget of the average Irish citizen, but England could still pay the higher price. The perverse result was that even during the Great Famine, Ireland was actually still a net exporter of food (The Great Irish Famine, 1996).