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> some people might not be able to get cigarettes from the gas station, or buy gas without a credit card. Switching to credit card kiosks won't help. It's usu

> some people might not be able to get cigarettes from the gas station, or buy gas without a credit card. Switching to credit card kiosks won't help. It's usually illegal to have a gas station operating without an attendant. Something to do with that whole danger of blowing up and killing lots of people thing. > maybe, out of 5 gas stations, 1 will remain open and now have 5 times as many customers Except it costs some money to open and close the store, costs some money to have alarms & surveillance while the store is closed, costs the store in damages, and more than that, costs customers who will prefer the store that will always be open, even during normal hours. It may not all be as wasteful as you think. And what happens when the store that can justify staying open happens to be the one that doesn't provide diesel, propane, milk, or similar? It can be very detrimental to the city.

Supermancho 5y ago
> It's usually illegal to have a gas station operating without an attendant. Not in most of the US States I've visited. There are all-night gas stations across the nation that are unmanned. > Except it costs some money to open and close the store, costs some money to have alarms & surveillance while the store is closed I think you misunderstand. He's proposing that the competition of the 2-4 gas station clusters at most highway offramps/some intersections are over-competing. The permanent closing of some is a net good for the economy. Multi-trillion dollar companies will eventually note how they are taking increased losses/less profit when faced with the current economics (wage floors, limited spending power of the middle class, etc). Is this true? Probably not because the owners are largely franchisees who will not simply sacrifice their entire livelihood because profits are down. It's not like the owner of a Mobil station can set their own gas prices (near total control of these locations is baked into the franchise agreement, like with many large brands). The multi-billionaire brands aren't sweating a dime off their own fees when some location can't survive and closes down.

Supermancho 5y ago

> It's usually illegal to have a gas station operating without an attendant. Not in most of the US States I've visited. There are all-night gas stations across the nation that are unmanned. > Except it costs some money to open and close the store, costs some money to have alarms & surveillance while the store is closed I think you misunderstand. He's proposing that the competition of the 2-4 gas station clusters at most highway offramps/some intersections are over-competing. The permanent closing of some is a net good for the economy. Multi-trillion dollar companies will eventually note how they are taking increased losses/less profit when faced with the current economics (wage floors, limited spending power of the middle class, etc). Is this true? Probably not because the owners are largely franchisees who will not simply sacrifice their entire livelihood because profits are down. It's not like the owner of a Mobil station can set their own gas prices (near total control of these locations is baked into the franchise agreement, like with many large brands). The multi-billionaire brands aren't sweating a dime off their own fees when some location can't survive and closes down.