On Price Gouging
I never thought that I would write these words, but George
W. Bush is an idiot; he recently spoke out against price
gouging
. Well, the sad fact of the matter is that there is
no such thing as price gouging. Thomas Sowell aptly
demonstrated that it’s proper for prices to rise after a
disaster. For example, after a storm a chainsaw is more valuable
than it had been before—shouldn’t items sell for their
value? And in fact they do—if the price is more than an
item’s worth, people won’t pay it. It’s impossible to
sell something for more than it’s worth. I note that the news has
recently reported gas lines—well, if gas prices were allowed to
rise quickly enough, there would be no lines: when it’s
sufficiently expensive people will only buy it when they need it.
Someone, get our president (and our legislators, and the majority of our public commentators) some lessons in simple economics.
