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For the matter of price, i don't care what other buyers do with their purchased goods. I care how the seller treats the customer. If we were to discuss other a

by gtsop 5y ago

For the matter of price, i don't care what other buyers do with their purchased goods. I care how the seller treats the customer. If we were to discuss other aspects of mining then yes, i would point to other greedy participants in this chain

sokoloff 5y ago
If a seller has limited capacity to produce, is it better for a motivated buyer to be able to buy one, albeit at a price higher than they’d like? Or is it better if the price is what all buyers would like, but many motivated buyers can’t get one at all? Neither is perfectly “right”; it’s a direct trade off between “they’re available if you want one” and “they’re as inexpensive as you’ve come to expect from history”.
- gtsop 5y ago
  My personal answer on this question is the later. Price stays the same. Eventually the produced products will get into some people's hands. The only difference is how much of their money will end up in the seller's pocket. The motivation you have doesn't scale linearly with the amount of money you can spend. Eg you may have very poor people who would make great use of product X and are very motivated, but they can't grt their hands on it because it is too expensive for them. See the health/surgery industry as a great example.
  - sokoloff 5y ago
    There’s an additional wrinkle in that this choice tends to lead to intermediate sellers who take the latter choice and turn it into the former choice with additional friction and fraud risk (and no additional profit to the producer, which might give them incentive to scale up production to meet the overage of demand.) High end GPUs are readily available on EBay and other secondhand markets and I’ve resorted to buying them there to get them in for ML training machines. (Same with consoles, concert and sporting event tickets, and other limited production, desirable items.)
  - quesera 5y ago
    But it wouldn't play out that way. If demand exceeds supply, but the manufacturer continues to sell at normal prices, a scalper market opens up. Scalpers capture the difference between manufacturer sale price and market value. That's their business, so they have more time to dedicate to the search for product than the "poor people" who "should" have access to the product. Surgery is not a good example because there is no reseller market there. Medication would be closer but of course med sales are highly regulated. I agree with the point you're getting at though -- access to essential health care should not be financially bifurcated.

by gtsop 5y ago

sokoloff 5y ago

If a seller has limited capacity to produce, is it better for a motivated buyer to be able to buy one, albeit at a price higher than they’d like? Or is it better if the price is what all buyers would like, but many motivated buyers can’t get one at all? Neither is perfectly “right”; it’s a direct trade off between “they’re available if you want one” and “they’re as inexpensive as you’ve come to expect from history”.

gtsop 5y ago
My personal answer on this question is the later. Price stays the same. Eventually the produced products will get into some people's hands. The only difference is how much of their money will end up in the seller's pocket. The motivation you have doesn't scale linearly with the amount of money you can spend. Eg you may have very poor people who would make great use of product X and are very motivated, but they can't grt their hands on it because it is too expensive for them. See the health/surgery industry as a great example.
- sokoloff 5y ago
  There’s an additional wrinkle in that this choice tends to lead to intermediate sellers who take the latter choice and turn it into the former choice with additional friction and fraud risk (and no additional profit to the producer, which might give them incentive to scale up production to meet the overage of demand.) High end GPUs are readily available on EBay and other secondhand markets and I’ve resorted to buying them there to get them in for ML training machines. (Same with consoles, concert and sporting event tickets, and other limited production, desirable items.)
- quesera 5y ago
  But it wouldn't play out that way. If demand exceeds supply, but the manufacturer continues to sell at normal prices, a scalper market opens up. Scalpers capture the difference between manufacturer sale price and market value. That's their business, so they have more time to dedicate to the search for product than the "poor people" who "should" have access to the product. Surgery is not a good example because there is no reseller market there. Medication would be closer but of course med sales are highly regulated. I agree with the point you're getting at though -- access to essential health care should not be financially bifurcated.