If that's the case lets just make it $50/hour! Reality doesn't work that way. Your time is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it. If an employer is only willing to pay you $12.50 an hour for your time then you can LIKE getting paid $25/hour all day long and it isn't going to change the market value of your time.
On the other hand, if I think that the next employer is going to pay me 50 I am free to hold out for that, and it's none of your business what he does or does not pay me. If I don't meet the market price for my labor eventually I starve. The value of anything gun, labor, or widgets is what the 2 people making the transaction decide it is at that moment in time. No one else matters.
Sadly for many their knowledge of economics came from the public education system.....far better had they gotten a degree from the school of hard knocks and owning a business.
Amen!!!!!!!!!!!!
It could be the actual cost they need to get to stay in business and/or it could be a simple matter of GREED.
Greed can drive some people to do things they wouldn't ordinarily do!!
You say that like greed is a bad thing in a capitalist system. It's not, it's what drives all innovation, the greed for more comfort, more freedom, more time, more whatever is the desire that spurs the ideas that become the new products that revolutionize a society.
It's actually a beautiful thing in America. We are all FREE, not only to carry and own arms, but to choose from whom and under what terms we buy AND sell them. Those that get bent out of shape when they think a price is to high are showing an immaturity that is silly.
I was working a gun show a couple of weeks ago for a buddy. A very rude customer was trying to beat him down on a price. This guy was insulting the gun, and my friend who'd built the gun, and his selection, just everything, and then throwing low ball offers out that were less than the costs of the gun to my buddy. The rude customer finally straight out asked, "Why do you think you can get so much?"
He replied, "Because I've been getting that much." Which was true, he was right dead on the average price for that particular gun in that show. Not his tagged price, but his taking price.
The rude customer left in a huff, but without saying anything. I watched him leave the show empty handed. When asked about it later my buddy just said, "If I took every @$$&@(% seriously who didn't want to meet my price I'd never be able to sell anything at these shows because I'd be in jail for assault. So I just let it go."
No matter what you think something is worth, that someone else thinks it's worth more OR less is not an insult, it's just a difference of opinion so don't get your panties in a bunch. Either pay, haggle, or say no, and MOVE ON!
THAT'S FREEDOM!