You’ve defined the market to incorporate the state, and apparently everything else that ever has and ever will exist. This broad, supposedly Misesian claim that all purposive action can be subsumed under “the market” makes “the market” a completely useless term.
Clayton: I think your definition needs mention of money, because isn’t catallactics (can’t find “catallacty”) concerned solely with exchanges done with money? It is directed precisely at the question of economic calculation using money prices. Market activity, then, is voluntary exchange conducted in money. This allows us to better distinguish what is and is not part of the market. We might say a man gives time and a sympathetic ear with a woman he fancies in exchange for a roll in the hay, but it is not market activity. A man also gives money to a mugger in exchange for his life, but it is not market activity, The resulting state of affairs in both cases is not a “market outcome.”
There is an important question here, it’s just posed horribly, bringing in the market for no real reason. This was a better way to put it.