Fail as compared to what? Is there a system that handles disasters so well that no one complains? Or that does much better without sacrificing in other relevant areas?

Market failures are a rich literature: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_failure

There is no single system that does better universally, but there are plenty of narrow fixes that do fine. As an example, scarce donor organs are not allocated based on ability to pay, but in other ways: https://optn.transplant.hrsa.gov/learn/about-transplantation...

> Market failures are a rich literature

Sure, I was not saying markets are perfect, I asked what system with no markets is better?

> There is no single system that does better universally, but there are plenty of narrow fixes that do fine.

Agreed.

> As an example, scarce donor organs are not allocated based on ability to pay, but in other ways: https://optn.transplant.hrsa.gov/learn/about-transplantation....

And if you investigate it I'm sure you'll also find plenty of examples of failures in organ allocation.

"scarce donor organs are not allocated based on ability to pay, but in other ways"

That only is true if we ignore the organ black markets that many millionaires/billionaires have access to.

Well they'll certainly fail next time, that's for sure.