takeing advantage. ye old 'greed system'.
Um, that would be ye old capitalist market economy now, wouldn't it?
I've maintained for a long time that this shortage would have ended a lot sooner had prices risen early instead of waiting so long. It would have reduced hoarding, caused people to take advantage of alternatives (which, sadly, would include less shooting), and brought supply and demand into balance a lot sooner.
Then, as the hysteria subsided, prices would have come down, supply up, and by now, we'd be back to normal.
It's unlikely very many would agree with this, but IMO but businesses trying to keep prices low have exacerbated the shortages. When supply does appear at those prices, it gets bought out immediately, which creates a self-fulfilling prophecy.
There's a great article by George Will on this phenomenon here:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/158752/page/1
Here's the relevant quote from the article:
Roberts, an economist at George Mason University and Stanford's Hoover Institution, sets his story in the Bay Area, where some Stanford students are indignant because a Big Box store doubled its prices after an earthquake. A student leader plans to protest Stanford's acceptance of a large gift from Big Box. The student's economics professor, Ruth, rather than attempting to dissuade him, begins leading him and his classmates to an understanding of prices, markets and the marvel of social cooperation.
.......................
But back to Big Box doubling prices after the earthquake. The indignant student, who had first gone to Home Depot for a flashlight, says it "didn't try to rip us off." It was, however, out of flashlights. Ruth suggests that the reason Big Box had flashlights was that its prices were high. If prices were left at regular levels, the people who would have got the flashlights would have been those who got to the store first. With the higher prices, "someone who had candles at home decided to do without the flashlight and left it there for you on the shelf." Neither Home Depot nor the student who was angry at Big Box had benefited from Home Depot's price restraint.
I believe this is exactly the situation that has faced the shooting community since November.
Had prices on primers in our local gun shops risen early--to $30 or even $40 a brick, say--we
would have been able to find them. People would have been less inclined to buy out stocks of primers when they found them if they cost 50 or even 100 percent more. That would have left more on the shelves, would have reduced the impression of there being shortages, would have reduced hysterical demand, and we'd have resolved this issue in February.
Sadly, the attempts to keep prices low subverted the very market forces which would have solved the problem a lot sooner.
later. They're not stupid, they've just come out of a long era of the State running everything. Call this the "reverse of the 'Peace Dividend.'"
tightens the leash.
