Re:Amazon sellers marking products as collectible to get aro...
by pitaj on Friday May 29, 2020 @05:42PM
(#23355904)
The price mechanism is even more important in these cases though. Preventing it from adequately responding to changes in supply and demand only causes more shortages.
Re:Amazon sellers marking products as collectible to get aro...
by duxup on Friday May 29, 2020 @05:50PM
(#23355963)
What response exactly?
You can't build a bottled water factory overnight, it's not economically sensible to do so to fulfill a short demand.... and if you can't get the bottled water thee for some reason then it is even less able to respond to demand.
Meanwhile buyers are not rational and those with extra money and will buy up huge amounts just to store "just in case" while places that need it won't get it.
Pricing fluctuations there don't really change anything. With humans being the buyers it just doesn't work out.
I don't think people mind that, and over the long term things work out.
But if we're talking about short term demand for specific products like say medical masks or bottled water during extraordinary events, it's not clear that someone can ramp up production to fulfill demand ... nor that those items will go to the places they're needed such as a hospital and not just someone with a lot of cash on hand's closet...
These short term extraordinary events don't seem to have the lead time for the market to work very well and the side effects are not considered desirable by many people.