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Are we saying ink-jet printers are a problem free market economics can't solve, or actually makes worse? What class of problem does this represent? Are there ot

Are we saying ink-jet printers are a problem free market economics can't solve, or actually makes worse? What class of problem does this represent? Are there other classes? I'm not an economist and only took very basic economics courses in college. We hear so much about the problems solved by free market economics but we don't hear so much about the problems not solved or even are exacerbated by free market economics. Just curious as to what these classes of problems might be.

ColanR 6y ago
It seems like the free-market solution is the cheap brother laser printers that keep being mentioned.
josephcsible 6y ago
Free market economics would solve this problem. The reason we still have this problem is that our market isn't free enough: once you buy something, it should be yours to do whatever you want with, but intellectual property laws are currently abused so that the solutions to this problem tend to be illegal.
Sohcahtoa82 6y ago
The market has solved this. But consumers are short-sighted and irrational. They'll buy the cheap HP inkjet printer rather than a laser printer because all they look at is the upfront cost. The free market makes this worse. Ideally, HP should be sued for false advertising when they sell you something with the promise something is free for life, then take it away in less than a year.
anonymfus 6y ago
I think that the thing that makes this problem practically unsolvable by market is that consumers most informed about deficiencies of the product are a the least affected by them. Specifically people with knowledge about tricks of printer manufacturers are likely to know how to hack DRM on cartridges and ever how to install continuous ink systems, and so are not interested in buying more expensive printers without trickery. Another example of the same problem probably more familiar to HN audience (we have more network hackers here than printer hackers) is routers and other internet of shit: standard firmware tends to be very insecure because people who understand how bad it is tend to ignore the security of firmware in their buying decisions as they just want a hardware compatible with software they will install themself. As there is a term "lemon market" for information asymmetry between buyers and sellers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons ) I think we need to choose some other fruit as a term for that kind of information asymmetry between buyers that I am talking about.

ColanR 6y ago

It seems like the free-market solution is the cheap brother laser printers that keep being mentioned.

josephcsible 6y ago

Free market economics would solve this problem. The reason we still have this problem is that our market isn't free enough: once you buy something, it should be yours to do whatever you want with, but intellectual property laws are currently abused so that the solutions to this problem tend to be illegal.

Sohcahtoa82 6y ago

The market has solved this. But consumers are short-sighted and irrational. They'll buy the cheap HP inkjet printer rather than a laser printer because all they look at is the upfront cost. The free market makes this worse. Ideally, HP should be sued for false advertising when they sell you something with the promise something is free for life, then take it away in less than a year.

anonymfus 6y ago

I think that the thing that makes this problem practically unsolvable by market is that consumers most informed about deficiencies of the product are a the least affected by them. Specifically people with knowledge about tricks of printer manufacturers are likely to know how to hack DRM on cartridges and ever how to install continuous ink systems, and so are not interested in buying more expensive printers without trickery. Another example of the same problem probably more familiar to HN audience (we have more network hackers here than printer hackers) is routers and other internet of shit: standard firmware tends to be very insecure because people who understand how bad it is tend to ignore the security of firmware in their buying decisions as they just want a hardware compatible with software they will install themself. As there is a term "lemon market" for information asymmetry between buyers and sellers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons ) I think we need to choose some other fruit as a term for that kind of information asymmetry between buyers that I am talking about.