'Leaving it to Market Forces'

Hi guys, hope everyone is alright with exams coming up soon! I'm doing the AQA exam board.
Anyways, my query is that many 25 mark questions ask whether governments should intervene or not? So my question is, what would happen if a government didn't intervene? i.e. 'leave it to market forces'?
When i ask this, it's obvious that if we don't intervene with merit or demerit goods then this creates externalities, but I'm talking about food, so for an example, what would happen if the government didn't intervene with the wheat prices and left it to the market force? So there would be no subsidies, buffer stocks etc etc

If someone could say what would happened, and the advantages and disadvantages of leaving it to market forces, i would really be grateful.

Thank you, and good luck to everyone!

No government intervention = market failures such as volatility of commodity prices, inequality, merit and demerit goods
Advantages leaving it to market forces = benefits of using price mechanism, avoiding government failiure

Hi.

Essentially, 'leaving it to the free market' solution means that yes, externalities do occur. The problem with leaving things to the free market is, such as housing for example, the free market price is often too high for first time buyers, similarly with Wheat, the free market price is too high so basically, you could argue (using the source that the average Italian eats 28kgs of pasta a year) that it is a necessity, and if left to the free market negative externalities of under consumption could arise, such as poverty etc.n Also, if the government does intervene you must remember that this is an 'opportunity cost' to the Italian taxpayer, with over a £trillion national debt, and currently, shrinking macroeconomy, subsidising wheat through taxpayers money could have been spent on healthcare and education (which have more long-term) benefits.

However, leaving it to the free market could be seen as more sustainable as free-market economists would argue that the market mechanism allocates resources efficiently (through the equilibrium of s & d), and through the government intervening this may create government failure (such as the law of unintended consequences and so on and so forth, such as spending too much money, or lets say, damaging health - try and play on the whole healthcare and education thing, it makes the examiners weepy etc.)

Hope this helps