There are many themes woven throughout Carlo Collodi’s Le Avventure di Pinocchio (1883) that have been examined in great detail. One that has seemingly been neglected, however, is the sustained attention to market economics and free trade displayed throughout the tale. In line with many eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European writers—from Adam Smith to Manzoni—Collodi stresses the necessity of engaging economically with fellow citizens (i.e., without force or coercion) to navigate the complicated capitalist system that was taking hold in the Western world. Pinocchio seeks, from practically the moment of his “birth,” to gain his freedom. Nevertheless, he quickly discovers that you can’t eat liberty. Freedom may be an essential birthright, but without wealth or title, individuals must enter the marketplace and forge their own destiny in order to thrive—or, as the puppet discovers, merely to survive. Since money doesn’t “grow on trees”—a lesson he will explicitly learn from the Fox and the Cat—Pinocchio must learn a vocation. Collodi will work hard to make his star character’s life challenging but in the end, Pinocchio, more than simply becoming a boy, will become an entrepreneur.