Yes, really. The effects of supply and demand influence much more of our lives than simple monetary transactions. But we're getting off topic so let's not go farther with that one.
I think you missed it altogether. Intrinsic value and market value are non synonymous.
There is no such thing as "intrinsic value." It's a fallacious theory. There are costs for finished goods, raw materials, parts, pieces, labor, overhead, etc., etc., but you can't even look at those costs, the week you put your gun, car, house, etc. together, and say that's an "intrinsic value" because all of those parts and pieces -- and the raw materials for them, all the way back to the costs of the right to the minerals, timber, energy, and labor to harvest them, are dictated by the market. Your house is worth $100,000 because that's what it cost in materials and labor? Oh? Why did the studs cost $3.50 each? Why did the fuel for the delivery truck cost $3.89 a gallon? Why did the electrician's or plumber's labor cost $60 or $120 an hour? Why did...? I'm sure you get the point.
Now on to another point: If you're a manufacturer of things (any things) you'd better flippin' HOPE your goods are WORTH more -- much more! -- than it costs to produce them! Otherwise, you're out of business before you start. There's a word for a company that makes goods that aren't worth more than the labor, and materials, and overhead, (and transport, and distribution, and retailing, and taxes, and...) it costs to make those goods: FAILURES.
Those houses are worth exactly what is cost to build them, considering like and similar condition.
Wait, what? They're worth exactly what it cost to build them? Or something considering like and similar condition? That's two completely different things! Cost to build them is heavily dependent on market forces (and as we've seen, no builder will stay in business if his houses are only worth what it cost him to build them! That's just working your way into bankruptcy.), but it is a single-point recorded amount which is handy. However, condition modifiers and "comps" of other houses similar to that one are totally at odds with cost to construct and often FAR different! Why include them in one sentence as if they were related?
$100K homes are not suddenly worth $50, next year $5000, the next year $500.
Uh, tell that to the folks who want to buy and sell! You can CLAIM the house you want to sell is worth what you paid to build it. (Well...what YOU paid? Or what the builder paid? Or what the materials suppliers paid? Or? ...
) But that claim won't get you one extra nickle at settlement. You can CLAIM that a house in a nice neighborhood is only worth what it cost the previous owner, or the owner 15 owners back(!), to build it, but that will get you laughed out of the real estate office.
You can claim those things, but they're detached from any form of reality.
Supply and demand does not ensure "exactly the right amount" is being paid.
Well, yes, yes it does. The law of supply and demand says that you pay whatever it takes to procure an item, and no more. You might have to pay more than it cost someone to make it because a lot of people also want to buy items like that and you have to outbid enough of them to procure one for yourself. You might have to pay a lot LESS than it cost someone to make it because there are a lot of these things around and few people want one. You don't GET to pay JUST what the maker paid, even though lots of folks would pay more. You don't HAVE to pay every penny that the maker paid, even though no one's bidding against you and he really needs to move these things and recoup as much of his costs as he can. You (have the chance to, at least) pay EXACTLY the perfect amount. No more or less than necessary.
And, what you pay becomes even more perfect because your price point "data" becomes part of the market and helps to define and change the market. Your price pulls the market price closer to itself. You've paid an amount and you've taken some of the available supply. You've informed the market.
Hey, feel good about yourself! YOU make a difference!
(Shucks, beats voting!
)
Equilibrium is what you refer to, and equilibrium can be artificially inflated or deflated.
Oh really? It is what it is. It's no more artificial than saying you're "artificially fat" because you eat a lot of Cheetos. Factors go in, results come out.
Were DPMS M4's "worth" $1400 6 months ago and now only "worth" $750. No, they were always worth exactly the same amount of money.
Well, if you think that's the case, you'd better tell me what that "same amount of money" is. Is it $750? Why? What makes it WORTH $750?
But let's say it is $750. WHY was it $750? Because the market said so. There were x,xxx DPMS M4s for sale for every x,xxx people who wanted one on any given day. That surplus or deficit of guns for buyers pushed the price to $750. DPMS makes a few too many, that price falls to $650. DPMS makes a thousand or so fewer that month, the price rises to $850. All moderated and modulated by a market full of makers doing the same thing and choosing different price points at which to sell. Everyone and their brother wants whatever AR they can get? Price rises to $1,400.
Neither price is one iota more "artificial" than any other. They just are what they are.
Now DPMS might be able to survive as a company on the profit from making that gun and selling it for $750. They might be breaking even or losing money selling it for $650. They might be banking cash and opening up new divisions, taking home fat bonuses, and investing heavily into R&D if they're selling each one for $1,400. None of that matters at all to what their guns are WORTH.
If members here are "largely dedicated" to being foolish enough to pay $400-$600 for a $60 rifle, tell me again what is strange.
Once again, it isn't and never was a "$60 rifle" in any sense of the word that has meaning, and second -- if the price to buy a semi-automatic military surplus rifle is $400-$600, and they want to own one, they aren't FOOLS for buying. They may be POSSIBLY intemperate for buying now and not waiting for a better deal. They may POSSIBLY be very prescient for buying at only $600 when that rifle might have been worth $1,200 in another year. (And depending where you live, that's a very real possibility.)
When the price of poker is $600, and we constantly clamor that we need more folks on our side playing our brand of poker, it seems very counter-productive to ridicule them and label them FOOLS for jumping in the game.
Like I said, the days of non-inflated SKS's won't be over unless fools and the misinformed continue to cause artificial inflation of the price.
DO you have any -- really, ANY -- concept of what a non-artificial price for an SKS "should" be today? Pick a number. But declare your reasoning for coming up with that number. Is it just whatever the Russian or Chinese or Albanian government paid ... uh, itself(?) or whatever... to make it in the 1950s or '60s? Is it what someone would have had to pay to get one in the USA in 1960? Is it what Ruger would have to charge today to make that rifle and turn a profit? Is it what someone could have bought one for in 1991? Is it what a resident of a ban state would have to pay for a "grandfathered" one? Is it what you could whittle one out yourself in your garage for? Where is the "intrinsic" value set?
[EDIT TO ADD:]
It is still a $60 gun ... <and, later>...The fact is the SKS likely cost $30 or less to produce.
I assure you, $30 USD has nothing at all with what it cost any of those governments to produce them. How would you even begin to figure it out anyway? Command economies, heavily subsidised production throughout a half-dozen or so different producing countries in several different parts of the world, in multiple decades? All you've basically said is that these guns cannot be valued properly because there is literally NO way to begin to calculate a standard of what it cost to produce them. Your guess that it cost about $30 to make one is about as groundless as any guess I'd make on the number of strands of spaghetti it would take to span from here to the moon -- except that my guess would be A LOT EASIER to substantiate!
I'm usually amused by most of your ripostes.
I prefer them with marmalade.
