3 ms·

But that's not the situation at hand. It's three people offering me $1000 for something, I give it to you because you're the first person. Then, you turn aroun

by ctrl-j 10y ago

But that's not the situation at hand. It's three people offering me $1000 for something, I give it to you because you're the first person. Then, you turn around and say "hey, I'm selling this for $2000 because I never wanted it in the first place!" The two other people who were waiting can't afford it. Some other guy comes along later who can afford it and pays up. It's not fair, it's one of the nasty grimy sides of capitalism. Scalpers are 100% middle-men who don't add value. The tickets would sell at base cost. All they do is artificially inflate the value of tickets.

candiodari 10y ago
> Scalpers are 100% middle-men who don't add value. The tickets would sell at base cost. All they do is artificially inflate the value of tickets. Economic theory would say that 1) value, in contrast to price, is personal. Everything has a different value to everyone. For instance, it's a good bet French books have more value to me than to you, because I actually speak that language. 2) inflating value is impossible. Cannot be done So scalpers inflate the price, not the value. And only because of an inefficient market. Why is a lower price market inefficient ? It's not at equilibrium. That means there are either shortages or oversupply. And indeed : your complaint points out exactly that : a shortage. The scalpers actually do provide services for that profit : 1) they maintain ticket availability far beyond the original sale 2) they take risk away from the artist (some scalpers even in cooperation with the artist) (I bet real scalpers would also point out that both of these, the investment and the extended availability involve actual work that needs to be done. As in answering mails, posting stuff online, going out to sell the tickets, ...) So you're wrong on both fronts. They neither inflate value, nor do they lack services. And frankly, the only person who can solve this for real is the artist : if they find a way to do enough shows so everyone can watch, that is (obviously) the only way to guarantee everyone can make it. This is not hard, but because of the risk rarely done. Ironically, more and earlier scalping is one of the things that would make it a lot easier for the artist to do this, at least financially. Some artists do this, but perhaps that is more work for less (average) reward for the artist. Given these incentives, I would expect firstly that artists and venues would scalp tickets themselves, and secondly that all attempts at stomping out scalping will both make the problem worse and merely be a method to guarantee more profit for the designated scalpers. Of course in practice those are also exactly the people who don't want to take the financial risk, and so you'll have pussyfooting all around, lack of conviction, general complaints by everyone, and screwups.
- matwood 10y ago
  Good post. Everyone also seems to forget that scalpers sometimes have to sell at a loss if the event is not as popular. This is why event organizers don't mind scalpers and only pay lip service to stopping them.
- vacri 10y ago
  > 1) they maintain ticket availability far beyond the original sale By artificially and significantly suppressing it in the first place.
  - candiodari 10y ago
    Why do you think that ? They neither increase nor decrease the available places.
    - vacri 10y ago
      Ever try to buy a ticket from the proper vendor 10m after the tickets have been released? Saying that they maintain ticket availability for longer, it's a zero-sum game. The only reason those tickets are around longer than they otherwise would be, is because alternate purchasers were unable to get them. Put another way, if 100 tickets at $50 sell out in a day, and scalped at $500 sell out in a month, yes, the same amount of tickets is sold. But 'ticket availability lasting for a month' is only there because the scalper has removed the ticket availability for the $50 purchasers.
      - candiodari 10y ago
        > Put another way, if 100 tickets at $50 sell out in a day, and scalped at $500 sell out in a month, yes, the same amount of tickets is sold. But 'ticket availability lasting for a month' is only there because the scalper has removed the ticket availability for the $50 purchasers. Economic theory say that this isn't true. They should sell out at similar speed regardless of reselling happening or not. And from personal experience: efficient markets are better than inefficient markets. I've seen quite a few inefficient markets and they're ... well they're stupid. They impose ridiculous costs (like having to F5 continuously so you can "deal" with the shortage, but that's quite a trivial one). And yes, scalpers make the market more efficient. The presence or absence of scalpers does not change the basic problem : not enough spaces for everyone who wants to go. That cannot be solved by introducing rules against scalpers. In fact, the opposite is true. Seriously, the opposite approach would likely improve matters far more : create a large-scale scalping company that would pre-purchase large amounts of tickets as an investment and resell them later. The presence of this company would massively improve ticket availability by enabling and incentivizing artists to make more spaces available, and this would make everyone's life better.

by ctrl-j 10y ago

candiodari 10y ago

> Scalpers are 100% middle-men who don't add value. The tickets would sell at base cost. All they do is artificially inflate the value of tickets. Economic theory would say that 1) value, in contrast to price, is personal. Everything has a different value to everyone. For instance, it's a good bet French books have more value to me than to you, because I actually speak that language. 2) inflating value is impossible. Cannot be done So scalpers inflate the price, not the value. And only because of an inefficient market. Why is a lower price market inefficient ? It's not at equilibrium. That means there are either shortages or oversupply. And indeed : your complaint points out exactly that : a shortage. The scalpers actually do provide services for that profit : 1) they maintain ticket availability far beyond the original sale 2) they take risk away from the artist (some scalpers even in cooperation with the artist) (I bet real scalpers would also point out that both of these, the investment and the extended availability involve actual work that needs to be done. As in answering mails, posting stuff online, going out to sell the tickets, ...) So you're wrong on both fronts. They neither inflate value, nor do they lack services. And frankly, the only person who can solve this for real is the artist : if they find a way to do enough shows so everyone can watch, that is (obviously) the only way to guarantee everyone can make it. This is not hard, but because of the risk rarely done. Ironically, more and earlier scalping is one of the things that would make it a lot easier for the artist to do this, at least financially. Some artists do this, but perhaps that is more work for less (average) reward for the artist. Given these incentives, I would expect firstly that artists and venues would scalp tickets themselves, and secondly that all attempts at stomping out scalping will both make the problem worse and merely be a method to guarantee more profit for the designated scalpers. Of course in practice those are also exactly the people who don't want to take the financial risk, and so you'll have pussyfooting all around, lack of conviction, general complaints by everyone, and screwups.

matwood 10y ago
Good post. Everyone also seems to forget that scalpers sometimes have to sell at a loss if the event is not as popular. This is why event organizers don't mind scalpers and only pay lip service to stopping them.
vacri 10y ago
> 1) they maintain ticket availability far beyond the original sale By artificially and significantly suppressing it in the first place.
- candiodari 10y ago
  Why do you think that ? They neither increase nor decrease the available places.
  - vacri 10y ago
    Ever try to buy a ticket from the proper vendor 10m after the tickets have been released? Saying that they maintain ticket availability for longer, it's a zero-sum game. The only reason those tickets are around longer than they otherwise would be, is because alternate purchasers were unable to get them. Put another way, if 100 tickets at $50 sell out in a day, and scalped at $500 sell out in a month, yes, the same amount of tickets is sold. But 'ticket availability lasting for a month' is only there because the scalper has removed the ticket availability for the $50 purchasers.
    - candiodari 10y ago
      > Put another way, if 100 tickets at $50 sell out in a day, and scalped at $500 sell out in a month, yes, the same amount of tickets is sold. But 'ticket availability lasting for a month' is only there because the scalper has removed the ticket availability for the $50 purchasers. Economic theory say that this isn't true. They should sell out at similar speed regardless of reselling happening or not. And from personal experience: efficient markets are better than inefficient markets. I've seen quite a few inefficient markets and they're ... well they're stupid. They impose ridiculous costs (like having to F5 continuously so you can "deal" with the shortage, but that's quite a trivial one). And yes, scalpers make the market more efficient. The presence or absence of scalpers does not change the basic problem : not enough spaces for everyone who wants to go. That cannot be solved by introducing rules against scalpers. In fact, the opposite is true. Seriously, the opposite approach would likely improve matters far more : create a large-scale scalping company that would pre-purchase large amounts of tickets as an investment and resell them later. The presence of this company would massively improve ticket availability by enabling and incentivizing artists to make more spaces available, and this would make everyone's life better.