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God forbid people be allowed to voluntarily exchange their money for essential supplies! Snark aside, whether it made economic sense or not was up to those peo
by liber8 14y ago
God forbid people be allowed to voluntarily exchange their money for essential supplies!
Snark aside, whether it made economic sense or not was up to those people to decide. Clearly, it didn't make economic sense for people to drive 1000 miles to sell generators at cost, because people stopped doing it once they weren't allowed to profit.
Posters upstream discuss rationing, which never works well either. It still ends up in an inefficient distribution of resources. This is logical. How can the person doing the rationing possibly know how much water each of 300,000 individuals needs? Maybe I have a bunch at home and don't need any, whereas my neighbor needs extra because he's severely dehydrated. Whenever rationing occurs, there is always increased corruption and graft, and a market for the coupons (or whatever tally method is chosen) always arises anyway.
- pavel_lishin 14y ago> Clearly, it didn't make economic sense for people to drive 1000 miles to sell generators at cost, because people stopped doing it once they weren't allowed to profit. I literally thought they weren't letting anyone into the Katrina-damaged areas, whether they were trying to gouge people, or just sell necessary supplies, or even give them away for free. I understand their rationalization - how do you tell a do-gooder from a looter? And even if you can prove they're a do-gooder, how do you know they won't fall victim to crime, and become another casualty for you to worry about? But I do disagree with it.