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And yet, William, if you had bothered to read the link in your comment, you'd discover in the "Opposition to laws against price gouging" section that there are
by harryh 9y ago
And yet, William, if you had bothered to read the link in your comment, you'd discover in the "Opposition to laws against price gouging" section that there are numerous people who think these laws are bad and that they make some pretty good points.
In the case of Shkreli and Daraprim the price change induced Imprimis to bring a new drug online which added strength and diversity to the marketplace which is what we expect to happen in a well functioning marketplace when parties work to maximize their own self interest.
- wpietri 9y agoThere's a big difference between "some pretty good points" and "don't have an ethical leg to stand on". If you're now acknowledging that there is in fact a reasonable case for anti-gouging, that's a step forward. Thanks. Sure, one of Shkreli's attempts to gouge was partially thwarted by a competitor. Were all of them? Is there any guarantee that all future gouging attempts would be equally pointless? Of course not. Because, your free-market fundamentalism aside, markets fail all the time. That's why to get well-functioning marketplaces we outlaw a great variety of market-harming behaviors. Including things like price gouging for things people need to survive. Markets are not ends in themselves. They exist, with extensive societal support, because they're a useful mechanism to provide a reasonable distribution of goods and services to humans in those societies. When parasitic actors use those mechanisms to cause societal harm, it's entirely reasonable to tinker with the mechanism.