economics and information

I've remarked a couple of times that economics is really about incentives. But consider this: if economics were just about incentives, then theoretically, we could get out of this economic crisis by just abolishing the system as it is, and telling people to go back to work - and then we'd have jobs and productivity and health care, etc. (Let's assume that people actually would go to work).

There's a problem, though. How would people know what work to do? The market system, in a way, is about distributing information: about letting people know what work needs to be done. It is a system for collecting, determining, and distributing information.

(these remarks are rather abstract and general and light on the details).