There needs to be a level of government intervention and safeguards in a market.
I'd argue the lack of government rails in the past 55 years has made things vastly worse for the consumer. For instance, market consolidation, prior to the 70s where you had significantly more competition among market segments.
Mergers and acquisitions have largely gone unchecked leaving certain companies owning huge portions of market-share with few competitors and shareholder return being the primary area of concern, not customer satisfaction which largely becomes irrelevant in such a consolidated market.
Then you have things like consume protection a necessary spend due to how companies can treat customers these days, including banks. Airlines, phone companies, financial institutions, etc. can all be predatory and extremely difficult to get what you are entitled to.
A good functioning society, needs government innervation into the free market or else, anyone with a brain can see how it can and eventually will go full dystopian. That's the bare minimum, delving into public safety nets can become more contentious, of what and how much and what are xyz's requirements.
Too bad the government needs all the bureaucratic predation to keep its stranglehold until the next financial crisis, and the next one, and the next one and the next one.....