No one wants to spend money that doesn't have to be spent. The argument is over what has to be spent. I agree that there are differing definitions at play.
The free market can be contained and guided. Governments set the platforms on which the free market operates, and it can be manipulated much like water can be poured into different shape cups. Water doesn't stop being water when it's poured into a different container... The free market can absolutely be leveraged into efficient solutions for societal problems. We do it all the time. If you want to think of the free market as a singleton then you'll have to include all interconnections and energy exchange throughout the entirety of the universe, which happens to include the human forces which are capable of regulating small parts of itself the way any other sustainable system does.
The free market can be contained and guided. Governments set the platforms on which the free market operates, and it can be manipulated much like water can be poured into different shape cups. Water doesn't stop being water when it's poured into a different container... The free market can absolutely be leveraged into efficient solutions for societal problems. We do it all the time. If you want to think of the free market as a singleton then you'll have to include all interconnections and energy exchange throughout the entirety of the universe, which happens to include the human forces which are capable of regulating small parts of itself the way any other sustainable system does.