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Post by avordvet on Aug 31, 2017 4:19:01 GMT -5
I passed this to family and friends, you should do the same. Be Thankful for Price Gouging in HoustonBy Joe Jarvis - August 29, 2017 Did the hotel crew need the rooms? No. They came to “cover” the storm. But people fleeing Hurricane Harvey were in desperate need of hotel rooms. And the news crew was complaining about paying a high price. The news team reported on the terrible incident of gouging. But they actually demonstrate exactly why prices need to go up when demand goes up. I wonder if they decided to bunk up together and buy fewer rooms because of the high price. After all, that is the whole point of “gouging.” When demand shoots through the roof, the reason prices need to go up is not simply business greed. Higher prices slow demand. www.thedailybell.com/news-analysis/be-thankful-for-price-gouging-in-houston/
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Post by avordvet on Sept 8, 2017 16:26:55 GMT -5
Robert Murphy: 3 'Good' Things About "Price-Gouging"by Tyler Durden, Sep 7, 2017 6:55 PM, Authored by Robert Murphy via The Mises Institute, As so often happens in the wake of a natural disaster, government officials in Texas are currently investigating claims of “price gouging,” which the office of the Attorney General reminds residents is illegal after the governor declares a disaster. This is a classic example of the ostensible contrast between greed and altruism, capitalism and charity. Economists who favor the free market know the standard arguments for letting the price skyrocket to “clear the market” when there are supply shortages and demand spikes. These are important arguments, and indeed I will review them below. At the same time, I think in our zeal to lecture the public on the efficient allocation of resources, we economists often forget to stress an important aspect of private morality when disaster strikes. Specifically, if certain individuals experience a genuine “windfall gain” simply because they happen to be holding goods that suddenly become very scarce, then these individuals can donate their windfall to support relief efforts. In this way, there is no question of them profiting from their neighbors’ suffering. Market prices are still able to perform their valuable function of communicating information about supplies and demands to everyone in the system, while the losses imposed by nature are more evenly distributed because of charitable assistance given from the lucky to the unlucky. www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-09-07/3-good-things-about-price-gouging
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