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You neglected to mention that when people see fake headlines about toilet paper scarcity, there's a nontrivial percentage of people who see that as an opportuni

You neglected to mention that when people see fake headlines about toilet paper scarcity, there's a nontrivial percentage of people who see that as an opportunity for said arbitrage. There's two kinds of hoarding happening here: fear-alleviating and profit-seeking, which allows the profit seeking form of acquisition to be possible. Several weeks ago, it wouldn't have been feasible for someone to scoop up the entire market. Profit-seeking acquisition is however both a self fulfilling prophecy for the fake headlines about insufficient production, and a means by which the people seeking these products to alleviate fear have their fears justified. So is your solution "good on them, they're taking advantage of people's fears to help make the rumors true?" Just what price do you think toilet paper should be right now in stores?

daenz 7y ago
>So is your solution "good on them, they're taking advantage of people's fears to help make the rumors true?" My solution is we should do all that we can to decrease the latency that prices respond to supply and demand. It will help everyone. >Just what price do you think toilet paper should be right now in stores? That's not up to me to decide, because I don't presume to speak for the individual wants and needs for all participating suppliers and consumers, which is how a price is determined.
- forkexec 7y ago
  Increasing retail prices doesn't do any good, especially normal people who need one package of TP, limiting quantities does. That's a fairer way to solve it than treat TP like some damn Bitcoin.
  - bgorman 7y ago
    As someone who isn't hoarding TP, I would much rather be able to buy one package of toilet paper for 50 dollars versus being able to buy zero for 5 dollars. If people don't have access to toilet paper they will become hysterical. Raising prices is the obvious way to fix this. Less people will be willing to buy excess tp rolls if it costs 50 dollars a roll.
    - lonelappde 7y ago
      Eat less carbs, eat more fiber, don't overeat, and you'll have nicely firm occasional feces and you can rinse in the shower.
  - EdgarVerona 7y ago
    To bgorman: (apparently I can't reply directly to you, there's some nesting limit in Hacker News [EDIT: apparently not? I see a "reply" button now where it didn't exist before? odd]) >I would much rather be able to buy one package of toilet paper for 50 dollars versus being able to buy zero for 5 dollars. Yeah, because you have 50 dollars to spend on that. What's a person supposed to do who is only barely making ends meet? Do they forsake eating so they can wipe themselves? Underpay their rent? Go into debt so they can wipe their ass? My point here is that this isn't an either/or situation. There's other alternatives, though some people won't like it. Rationing - at least by stores if not by the government - is one that we don't like these days, but that has worked for us in historical times of trouble. This law is meant to be another alternative. It's certainly not perfect - I'd have taken rationing initiated by stores over that - but it is an alternative to the "pay 50 for a roll or not have a roll at all" options.
    - gruez 7y ago
      >apparently I can't reply directly to you, there's some nesting limit in Hacker News [EDIT: apparently not? I see a "reply" button now where it didn't exist before? odd]) AFAIK it's an anti-flamewar mechanism. Successively deeper comments require longer cooldowns before replies can be made.
  - daenz 7y ago
    >Increasing retail prices doesn't do any good, especially normal people who need one package of TP So raising the price on something doesn't reduce the number of "normal people" purchasing it? Are you honestly telling me that you don't think they are fundamentally linked?
forkexec 7y ago
The Lottery ticket folks who see this as their one miraculous "opportunity" to become "billionaires" based on toilet paper, hand sanitizer, Lysol and powdered milk hoarding and selling individually on eBay at 10000% of retail. All stores had to do was limit quantities, but they didn't.
- EdgarVerona 7y ago
  I definitely agree with that. I'm totally in support of the idea of limiting quantities, and I do think that would be a rational solution in the face of these current extenuating circumstances.
cl0rkster 7y ago
Seems to me that it's unlikely the toilet paper producers are perpetually running at 100% factory output. Something tells me they will respond by increasing production. Why? Because they are seeing enormous sales currently. Of course they want more. With some of the supply chain troubles we are having with everything closing, though, the delay might be slightly longer. I highly doubt this shortage will last longer than a couple of weeks. Even if I'm wrong, I'll keep believing that... Because honestly, the fear people have is as bad as the illness at this point.
- EdgarVerona 7y ago
  Unfortunately we don't have the data, only the evidence of whether their capacity is meeting demand. Right now it's not - but we will see in a week or two. If it continues to not do so, it seems rational to believe that they have reached the level of capacity where it would become more prohibitively expensive to increase supply. And at that point, the industry is going to have to face either severe short term shortages or potential long term financial trouble for short term gain. I hope it doesn't reach that.
- mhb 7y ago
  There's another benefit of the signal sent by high prices. It encourages the use of alternatives. There are many substitutes for toilet paper including other paper products and bidets.
  - EdgarVerona 7y ago
    That is a good point, and if that was an outcome of this situation that'd be great, as long as people who otherwise can't afford/can't find toilet paper can get their hands on them. On a personal level I think bidets are fantastic. I'm not sure why they didn't spread in the United States.
    - dillonmckay 7y ago
      Also, why ducted A/C?
  - 7y ago

daenz 7y ago

>So is your solution "good on them, they're taking advantage of people's fears to help make the rumors true?" My solution is we should do all that we can to decrease the latency that prices respond to supply and demand. It will help everyone. >Just what price do you think toilet paper should be right now in stores? That's not up to me to decide, because I don't presume to speak for the individual wants and needs for all participating suppliers and consumers, which is how a price is determined.

forkexec 7y ago
Increasing retail prices doesn't do any good, especially normal people who need one package of TP, limiting quantities does. That's a fairer way to solve it than treat TP like some damn Bitcoin.
- bgorman 7y ago
  As someone who isn't hoarding TP, I would much rather be able to buy one package of toilet paper for 50 dollars versus being able to buy zero for 5 dollars. If people don't have access to toilet paper they will become hysterical. Raising prices is the obvious way to fix this. Less people will be willing to buy excess tp rolls if it costs 50 dollars a roll.
  - lonelappde 7y ago
    Eat less carbs, eat more fiber, don't overeat, and you'll have nicely firm occasional feces and you can rinse in the shower.
- EdgarVerona 7y ago
  To bgorman: (apparently I can't reply directly to you, there's some nesting limit in Hacker News [EDIT: apparently not? I see a "reply" button now where it didn't exist before? odd]) >I would much rather be able to buy one package of toilet paper for 50 dollars versus being able to buy zero for 5 dollars. Yeah, because you have 50 dollars to spend on that. What's a person supposed to do who is only barely making ends meet? Do they forsake eating so they can wipe themselves? Underpay their rent? Go into debt so they can wipe their ass? My point here is that this isn't an either/or situation. There's other alternatives, though some people won't like it. Rationing - at least by stores if not by the government - is one that we don't like these days, but that has worked for us in historical times of trouble. This law is meant to be another alternative. It's certainly not perfect - I'd have taken rationing initiated by stores over that - but it is an alternative to the "pay 50 for a roll or not have a roll at all" options.
  - gruez 7y ago
    >apparently I can't reply directly to you, there's some nesting limit in Hacker News [EDIT: apparently not? I see a "reply" button now where it didn't exist before? odd]) AFAIK it's an anti-flamewar mechanism. Successively deeper comments require longer cooldowns before replies can be made.
- daenz 7y ago
  >Increasing retail prices doesn't do any good, especially normal people who need one package of TP So raising the price on something doesn't reduce the number of "normal people" purchasing it? Are you honestly telling me that you don't think they are fundamentally linked?

forkexec 7y ago

The Lottery ticket folks who see this as their one miraculous "opportunity" to become "billionaires" based on toilet paper, hand sanitizer, Lysol and powdered milk hoarding and selling individually on eBay at 10000% of retail. All stores had to do was limit quantities, but they didn't.

EdgarVerona 7y ago
I definitely agree with that. I'm totally in support of the idea of limiting quantities, and I do think that would be a rational solution in the face of these current extenuating circumstances.

cl0rkster 7y ago

Seems to me that it's unlikely the toilet paper producers are perpetually running at 100% factory output. Something tells me they will respond by increasing production. Why? Because they are seeing enormous sales currently. Of course they want more. With some of the supply chain troubles we are having with everything closing, though, the delay might be slightly longer. I highly doubt this shortage will last longer than a couple of weeks. Even if I'm wrong, I'll keep believing that... Because honestly, the fear people have is as bad as the illness at this point.

EdgarVerona 7y ago
Unfortunately we don't have the data, only the evidence of whether their capacity is meeting demand. Right now it's not - but we will see in a week or two. If it continues to not do so, it seems rational to believe that they have reached the level of capacity where it would become more prohibitively expensive to increase supply. And at that point, the industry is going to have to face either severe short term shortages or potential long term financial trouble for short term gain. I hope it doesn't reach that.
mhb 7y ago
There's another benefit of the signal sent by high prices. It encourages the use of alternatives. There are many substitutes for toilet paper including other paper products and bidets.
- EdgarVerona 7y ago
  That is a good point, and if that was an outcome of this situation that'd be great, as long as people who otherwise can't afford/can't find toilet paper can get their hands on them. On a personal level I think bidets are fantastic. I'm not sure why they didn't spread in the United States.
  - dillonmckay 7y ago
    Also, why ducted A/C?
- 7y ago