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Of course not. But my opinion is as useful as your anecdotal stories of one Cat 1 storm View Quote |
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Others in this or other threads had mentioned it. This is all I could find. Apparently it was Katrina and Mississippi. http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/11/01/in-praise-price-gouging.html If there was another instance in Texas related to Ike, I couldn't find it in a quick google. View Quote LOL....I guess in Mississippi generators are a necessity. |
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I'd agree - generators are most certainly NOT necessities. Except that apparently some dude was arrested after IKE for selling generators out of his trailer at significant markup. So, apparently not everyone shares that opinion. Including some LE who apparently didn't have better things to do. View Quote |
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Exactly. Have to find the story of the guy in Kentucky who (after a hurricane in Texas) decided to buy a bunch of generators in KY, drive down to TX and sell them at a 50% markup. People with a clue call that free enterprise and filling a need. The cops called it "gouging" and arrested him. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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LOL. Good luck with your centrally planned shortage goals of 2017. Price "gouging" simply enables people who actually need a resource to buy it. The market price for many things goes up during storms. If prices remain the same it results in a shortage. Higher prices mean people who actually need something can still get it. Supply and Demand, not even once. Stay "free" Texas. Georgia has a similar retard law unfortunately Have to find the story of the guy in Kentucky who (after a hurricane in Texas) decided to buy a bunch of generators in KY, drive down to TX and sell them at a 50% markup. People with a clue call that free enterprise and filling a need. The cops called it "gouging" and arrested him. |
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Guess what i am selling today? 1 gallon jugs of water for 4$.
Hahahahha stupid fucking ppl have a endless supply of water at their facets but yet are stupid enough not to go to walmart and buy containers to put it in for 99cents. So i am selling them what they already have. Ppl in krogers bitching that there is no bread. Hahah guess what, there is two racks full of tortillas 2 feet from them. This will be a very profitable hurricane for me. As they saying goes, a fool and his money soon part ways. |
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You guys really are fucking obtuse. It's amazing. I'm not saying charge $1000 always but for one person to say that the individual is bad because they should have prepared better and this wouldn't matter then to turn around and state that the it's a good thing that the business has to do something because they didn't prepare better is laughable. Just like the individual, of the business failed to adequately prepare shouldn't we just say "failure to prepare on their part does not constitute an emergency on my part"? View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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You're right; business owners should charge $1000 per bottle of water the rest of the time to "prepare" for emergencies. It's amazing how you "OMG PRICE-GOUGING!" types suddenly understand free-market pricing and its ability to efficiently allocate resources when it looks like the deal will work out in your favor. Otherwise it's "Hut hut hut!! with the guns & badges. |
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And I hope you aren't offended by my bluntness, I am certainly not offended by you not understanding my point completely from the onset. View Quote |
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I have two generators, plenty of food and water and have been through a shit-ton of hurricane's including Katrina.
It's easy to be prepared with the exception of gas, it's not practical to store 50 gals of gas in the suburbs, you really need to buy as needed when storms come your way. So yeah, it's bullshit when the foreign owned gas station on the corner triples the price of gas when a hurricane is predicted. Even though I believe in capitalism I'm good with laws against gouging. On another note, I think the govt should do something about the pharma industry's pricing as well. |
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I have two generators, plenty of food and water and have been through a shit-ton of hurricane's including Katrina. It's easy to be prepared with the exception of gas, it's not practical to store 50 gals of gas in the suburbs, you really need to buy as needed when storms come your way. So yeah, it's bullshit when the foreign owned gas station on the corner triples the price of gas when a hurricane is predicted. Even though I believe in capitalism I'm good with laws against gouging. On another note, I think the govt should do something about the pharma industry's pricing as well. View Quote |
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It's amazing how you "OMG PRICE-GOUGING!" types suddenly understand free-market pricing and its ability to efficiently allocate resources when it looks like the deal will work out in your favor. Otherwise it's "Hut hut hut!! with the guns & badges. View Quote |
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They are sometimes. Part of the law of the supply and demand. The guy with the biggest gun wins occasionally. And where are you then? Those screaming no government involvement, and then maybe they want the police when they lose the gun fight? And I support them, nobody should ever be shot for their pricing. View Quote |
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No not a swing and a miss, we keep hearing how if prices aren't allowed to triple or more there won't be anyone willing to sell product. I've not seen that to be the case. After Ike the only reason gas shortages occurred was because there wasn't electricity to pump it out of the ground in many places and stations did raise prices to match the cost of incoming replenishments just like every other station around the country. But even without being able to rake people over the coals to increase profits people opened their stores, some on generators, and kept doing business meaning that this scenario where lower prices lead to no necessities available didn't play out and that was in the fourth largest city in the nation with a lot of the population having been ill prepared. View Quote |
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Bullshit laws are fucking stupid. They only prevent necessary supplies from getting to needed areas. If I live in Ohio and have a load of generators in my store that are not selling because business is slow......I can not hire a a truck and a guy to drive them down TX because I could be charged with gouging if my selling price is too high. So......the generators get dusty on the shelf in Ohio. Ridiculous. Who does this help except the politicians who stroke themselves when they proclaim how they help the FOLKS. I own a store in Corpus Christi. If I raise my prices because a monster storm is coming........I could go to jail. Even though, after the storm , my store may be closed for weeks........maybe months if it is severely damaged. View Quote It's almost laughable, except they ignorantly vote for laws to force that very outcome, along with the fixed price controls that create artificial scarcity. |
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I work at a Lowes in South Austin. It's been a fucking madhouse yesterday and today.
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Holy fuck you people are fucking obtuse. The fucking question I answered specifically was why we're people buying generators out of trucks if they were available. And I answered it based on my own observations so it isn't fucking irrelevant TO THE FUCKING QUESTION I WAS ANWERING. View Quote |
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There's more salty/butt hurt Texans in here than a "Chili has beans" thread.
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Whee have I said OMG price gouging. I've never said anything of the sort. I've simply challenged the premise that with price controls we won't get our necessities. I've personally seen several hurricane recoveries in three states that have emergency price controls in place and other than Katrina we've managed to recover just fine without prices going through the roof. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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It's amazing how you "OMG PRICE-GOUGING!" types suddenly understand free-market pricing and its ability to efficiently allocate resources when it looks like the deal will work out in your favor. Otherwise it's "Hut hut hut!! with the guns & badges. And you're saying that a law against price increases on scarce goods worked fine when those goods weren't scarce? Hard to argue with that, I suppose. Until Katrina, when the government was too incompetent to get supplies to the affected zones and no one else was going to bother getting bottled water in Arkansas and driving 3 hours to sell it at the same price they bought it for. That worked out fucking great. In fact, whole swaths of the city sat rotting for years due to the parallel mentality that a windfall of governement aid was just around the corner and "someone else" was going to come and fix everything. |
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Theft and murder have nothing to do with the law of supply and demand. Let's say that you are sellling your generator at exactly the same price it was before the storm and you get shot by a guy with no money at all because he feels he needs it bad enough? Supply and demand orba criminal asshole? View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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They are sometimes. Part of the law of the supply and demand. The guy with the biggest gun wins occasionally. And where are you then? Those screaming no government involvement, and then maybe they want the police when they lose the gun fight? And I support them, nobody should ever be shot for their pricing. |
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The law of supply and demand always "works", crime or no crime.
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It's mind-boggling how much advice people that DON'T run businesses have for those that DO.
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That's my next project and to purchase a larger propane tank. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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Convert them to propane, propane stores indefinatly. So i use it now to run my gennys to power commercial icemakers, damn good money during hurricanes. The tanks lasts almost 4 years befpre needing a refill. |
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Page 10 would like to remind everyone that OP can simultaneously be correct about gouging laws and still deserve to be mocked for his obsession with Texas and inability to keep his word.
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You anecdotal "evidence" aside, the facts are that history clearly demonstrates that price controls cause shortages. You're talking about people volunteering to share their goods with their neighbors--something radically different than the state forcing them to do so. Apples and kumquats. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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No not a swing and a miss, we keep hearing how if prices aren't allowed to triple or more there won't be anyone willing to sell product. I've not seen that to be the case. After Ike the only reason gas shortages occurred was because there wasn't electricity to pump it out of the ground in many places and stations did raise prices to match the cost of incoming replenishments just like every other station around the country. But even without being able to rake people over the coals to increase profits people opened their stores, some on generators, and kept doing business meaning that this scenario where lower prices lead to no necessities available didn't play out and that was in the fourth largest city in the nation with a lot of the population having been ill prepared. |
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You just said they were--buying generators in a strip mall and in the parking lot. Where oh where did those generators magically appear from? View Quote |
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Learn to fucking read. I said I saw stores in strip malls that had generators for sale and people were still buying overpriced units out of the trucks in the parking lot because they saw them first. I was directly answering a specific question regarding why people were able to sell from trucks if stores had them available. I understand having an attention span of more than a few sentences is difficult but keep up. View Quote |
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Let me be clear for those who can't follow. Im fine with people taking advantage of panics to make a buck. My only argument in this has been against the premise that without rising prices there won't be anything to buy. That is quite likely on a nationwide scale but the scale we are discussing is a portion of one state and I've witnessed in three different states with price control laws on a number of hurricane recoveries that it isn't true.
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Yes, selling gasoline for seven dollars a gallon while people are trying to evacuate is capitalism. It's also one of those things that results in a breakdown of societal order very quickly and has people floating around in the gulf with a gunshot wound to the back of the head. View Quote |
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You contradicted yourself. You said people got by without "yankees" coming down with overpriced goods and then you talk about people buying them in strip malls and parking lots. You certainly are not consistent with your story telling. My cousin is down there right now and he's posting how there isn't a generator to be had anywhere. Guys those "anti-gouging" laws are working for you. View Quote |
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Go back and try again obviously at least a third time is necessary since you missed the one key fucking word PANIC! People were buying generators out of parking lots because they panicked and thought that was all they'd be able to get. Case in point. I stopped by Kroger to stock up on beer and queso fixings Wednesday. There was a guy selling cases of water he just bought inside for $5 more and was selling all he had, I head over to CVS to fill a prescription and there are cases of water cheaper than Kroger stacked all over the place. People panic and do stupid shit. View Quote Actually "panic" is exactly why price controls are wrong. People panic and buy up all the shit so nobody gets some at lower prices but in a free market the price will adjust to slow down those who panic buy and thus some goods will be left for those who actually need them. You actually proved my point. Free market price adjustments will reduce the impact of panic buyers on those with real need. |
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Holy fuck you two live in a fantasy world. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes |
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I dont know what the anti-gouge crew is even trying to prove anymore. None of them have made a valid point.
Having actually worked as a retailer in the power equipment industry at one time, I didnt see any evidence that state wide anti gouging laws played a role for us. Our local reputation was infinitely more valuable than any additional margin we might get in a few days time. However, we also couldnt take the risk of overstocking before a storm because the weather is too unpredictable. We tried to get the best margin we could, day in and day out, knowing that in a transactional, commodity market, even our best customers would buy elsewhere for to save a few dollars. We matched competitor pricing DAILY and rewarded customers who took the time to do comparison shopping and still came back us. When storms hit (both winter and tropical) we sold out of generators and chainsaws rapidly. We knew our distributors and suppliers werent going to get inventory to us in time to matter so we usually did not bother placing unusually large orders. When the last item sold, everyone after that was SOL until things went back to normal. So, when folks came to town with rental trucks, I said more power to 'em. They are fulfilling needs that we, as an established local retailer, simply could not do and didnt want to do. People that bought from them might have had buyer's remorse in the weeks and months after a storm but I never saw any criminal activity or even animosity directed towards them. In fact, most people wanted to know if we could direct them to them after they learned we were sold out. I hope they found the items they were so eager to find and pay for. Someday, I will start a thread called "Ask a guy who assembled dozens of chain saws in one morning anything." |
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I dont know what the anti-gouge crew is even trying to prove anymore. None of them have made a valid point. Having actually worked as a retailer in the power equipment industry at one time, I didnt see any evidence that state wide anti gouging laws played a role for us. Our local reputation was infinitely more valuable than any additional margin we might get in a few days time. However, we also couldnt take the risk of overstocking before a storm because the weather is too unpredictable. We tried to get the best margin we could, day in and day out, knowing that in a transactional, commodity market, even our best customers would buy elsewhere for to save a few dollars. We matched competitor pricing DAILY and rewarded customers who took the time to do comparison shopping and still came back us. When storms hit (both winter and tropical) we sold out of generators and chainsaws rapidly. We knew our distributors and suppliers werent going to get inventory to us in time to matter so we usually did not bother placing unusually large orders. When the last item sold, everyone after that was SOL until things went back to normal. So, when folks came to town with rental trucks, I said more power to 'em. They are fulfilling needs that we, as an established local retailer, simply could not do and didnt want to do. People that bought from them might have had buyer's remorse in the weeks and months after a storm but I never saw any criminal activity or even animosity directed towards them. In fact, most people wanted to know if we could direct them to them after they learned we were sold out. I hope they found the items they were so eager to find and pay for. Someday, I will start a thread called "Ask a guy who assembled dozens of chain saws in one morning anything." View Quote |
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So your are now a telepath and know what motivates people? Did those stores in those strip malls sell generators previously? If not, where did they come from? Why can't my cousin find a single one now? Actually "panic" is exactly why price controls are wrong. People panic and buy up all the shit so nobody gets some at lower prices but in a free market the price will adjust to slow down those who panic buy and thus some goods will be left for those who actually need them. You actually proved my point. Free market price adjustments will reduce the impact of panic buyers on those with real need. View Quote |
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Well that's retarded
I'm sure CO has something equally as dumb |
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Well that's retarded I'm sure CO has something equally as dumb View Quote “The price of a product or service alone is not a scam if it’s fully disclosed,” Colorado Assistant Attorney General Jan Zavislan said. “If the consumer has the information and has the right to shop around, but the sources in an emergency aren’t there, it might be an outrage to people, but there’s no specific law on the price itself.” |
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