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> And it ostensibly allows people to make a time/money tradeoff between waiting in line or for later supplies versus paying more. See my reply to vkou. This is

> And it ostensibly allows people to make a time/money tradeoff between waiting in line or for later supplies versus paying more. See my reply to vkou. This is exactly how scalpers make the situation better, by creating the availability of the choice to make a trade-off, where before there was no choice but to compete on latency or luck (which is fine for many consumers, but consumers vary in their ability to compete on latency and in their valuation of the trade-off).

vkou 10y ago
Giving people 'choices' in how goods are distributed doesn't always make the situation better. Consider rationing when there's a food shortage. We can either feed everyone (At reduced rations), or we can let some people pay more, to get more food, at the expense of letting others starve. Isn't it great to give people the choice between destitution and starvation? (Or, in the case of the poor, between starvation, and starvation.) There's a reason rationing is common in times of hunger.
- tkxxx7 10y ago
  Why consider this example, though, when a Switch, or a concert ticket or iPhone or whatever, is not necessary for survival?
  - vkou 10y ago
    Video games are obviously not life-saving food. I was using this example to demonstrate that optimizing for [choice/wealth] does not always result in better outcomes. Just as the parent post posits that optimizing for first come-first serve does not always result in better outcomes.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
tgb 10y ago
The analogy of that to your link is... tenuous at best. Your idea of helping people out is taking it from people willing to wait in line for it to people willing to pay for it. I don't view this as an atrocity like some would, but to even begin to question someone's ethical consistency based off that is suspect. It's clearly a trade-off and not actually a "small but positive change that gets demonized because it's incomplete". It gets demonized because some people don't think it's positive.

vkou 10y ago

Giving people 'choices' in how goods are distributed doesn't always make the situation better. Consider rationing when there's a food shortage. We can either feed everyone (At reduced rations), or we can let some people pay more, to get more food, at the expense of letting others starve. Isn't it great to give people the choice between destitution and starvation? (Or, in the case of the poor, between starvation, and starvation.) There's a reason rationing is common in times of hunger.

tkxxx7 10y ago
Why consider this example, though, when a Switch, or a concert ticket or iPhone or whatever, is not necessary for survival?
- vkou 10y ago
  Video games are obviously not life-saving food. I was using this example to demonstrate that optimizing for [choice/wealth] does not always result in better outcomes. Just as the parent post posits that optimizing for first come-first serve does not always result in better outcomes.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]

tgb 10y ago

The analogy of that to your link is... tenuous at best. Your idea of helping people out is taking it from people willing to wait in line for it to people willing to pay for it. I don't view this as an atrocity like some would, but to even begin to question someone's ethical consistency based off that is suspect. It's clearly a trade-off and not actually a "small but positive change that gets demonized because it's incomplete". It gets demonized because some people don't think it's positive.