Here's where your hand sanitizer went

[travelover]

I dunno, if they came out with a cure or prevention for coronavirus that worked as well as the Hep C cure, I would pay $1000 a pill for a few days. Far cheaper than shutting down the whole world.

Yea, but that is only a hypothetical How about reality? Just one example. https://www.vox.com/2019/4/3/18293950/why-is-insulin-so-expensive

 

[Fermion]

Yea, but that is only a hypothetical How about reality? Just one example. https://www.vox.com/2019/4/3/18293950/why-is-insulin-so-expensive

Well insulin is not really patented. With enough backing, you yourself could start producing and selling it as cheap as you want.

However:

'There’s also “extreme regulatory complexity” around bringing follow-on generic insulins to market, Luo added. And that’s something regulators, such as the Food and Drug Administration, have been working to streamline. "

So the article you linked admits that our regulatory complexity has been part of the problem in these high drug prices.

 

[travelover]

Well insulin is not really patented. With enough backing, you yourself could start producing and selling it as cheap as you want.

However:

'There’s also “extreme regulatory complexity” around bringing follow-on generic insulins to market, Luo added. And that’s something regulators, such as the Food and Drug Administration, have been working to streamline. "

So the article you linked admits that our regulatory complexity has been part of the problem in these high drug prices.

I'm not going to engage in a tit for tat with you. It is common knowledge that the pharma industry has been gouging Americans for quite a while. If you think other wise, I'm not going to change your mind. Have a good day.

 

[youbet]

Freely floating prices in an emergency situation is extraordinarily regressive, unfairly impacting people of low income and no wealth. If the products affected are truly discretionary, the impact is reduced, but if the products are critical, it can have serious consequences.

Usually Michael there is a combination of higher prices and free gov't or charitable supply in the case of critical commodities in a critical situation. During the days before a forecasted hurricane lands, the minimart on the corner likely doesn't have bottled water maked down in price. In fact, they likely have it priced at full suggested retail + . (something usually not seen on shelves). And stores are ordering more, usually to no avail but at least the demand signals are sent out to the supply chain.

When the SHTF, the semi-trailers of water provided by the gov't, Red Cross and other charitable organizations show up and are provided free.

Laissez Faire economics certainly needs to be constrained in many uncommon circumstances. But when it is suspended, other forces to signal the supply chain, control consumption and such need to be implemented. Without a proper balance, supply levels are inefficent and consumption uncontrolled and perhaps wasteful.

Everyone in this conversation is right to an extent. "It depends" on the particular circumstances.

 

[youbet]

I could support the floating price if the extra profit from raising the price in time of emergency went directly to a fund which helped out poor families. I don't like it going to the pockets of the sellers.

The complicated part is defining "emergency." Perhaps a situation declared on the state or national level by govenors or the president? Without clear guidelines, situations such as escalating wine prices due to a grape crop failure might be in the same category as people having to pay more for hand sanitizer (when they would be better off just thoroughly washing their hands anyway).

 

[youbet]

Let me suggest that there is a bigger picture. While the government is normally interested in a free and competitive market, it also has other important interests to serve. Among them are keeping us from rioting and killing each other. As others have noted above, price gouging pisses people off. You may argue economics with them all day long, but you will never change that. Pissed off people are more willing to riot and commit violence in times of stress and danger. It would not surprise me one bit to see these guys harmed or robbed. Sometimes it is best to step outside your tidy theories and see how the real world works.

I'm not sure which situation would be more likely to cause rioting:

1. Prices are held artifically low and demand is through the roof and it's a first-come, first-served world with with the first few customers reaching the stores emptying the shelves.

Or......

2. Prices rise and demand falls. People buy less with an unfair advantage to folks with more money. People at the lowest end of the spectrum perhaps getting cut off altogether.

It's a delicate balance. Laissez Faire economics has hurt a lot of folks over time. Inefficent gov't run controlled economies have hurt a lot of people over time.

 

[youbet]

I'm not going to engage in a tit for tat with you. It is common knowledge that the pharma industry has been gouging Americans for quite a while. If you think other wise, I'm not going to change your mind. Have a good day.

Clearly our gov't should let the pharma industry know right now that prices for drugs related to Covid-19 now being developed will be strictly controlled at very low levels regardless of what they spend developing the drugs or what it costs to manufacture them!

 

[youbet]

If you buy 20,000 bottles of hand sanitizer solely for your personal use, you are an idiot and socially irresponsible, but you haven't broken the law. It is the resale at grossly inflated prices in a declared state of emergency that is illegal. It's called price gouging, and if I were still with the attorney general's office, it would be my great pleasure to prosecute them for it.

It looks like prosecutors will be pretty busy!

Amazon said it had recently removed hundreds of thousands of listings and suspended thousands of sellers’ accounts for price gouging related to the coronavirus.

 

[copyright1997reloaded]

Clearly our gov't should let the pharma industry know right now that prices for drugs related to Covid-19 now being developed will be strictly controlled at very low levels regardless of what they spend developing the drugs or what it costs to manufacture them!

I wonder how few people (even those reading this forum) get this.

Right now, there is a wild scramble to develop a vaccine, better tests, medicines to treat, and so on. Some/many of them will be failures - and that money will be lost to those companies and the same people who complain about "excessive" profits will say "oh well". (Now I do realize that some/perhaps a lot is now beyond money - it is now approaching preservation of modern society in a similar fashion as we would find if we were in a traditional all out war.)

 

[sgstaley]

Just like ticket scalpers, if no one did business with them their "business" would collapse immediately.

I couldn't agree more.

 

[meleana]

I can't get the wipes or Lysol. I just use soap and water.

 

[neihn]

The complicated part is defining "emergency." Perhaps a situation declared on the state or national level by govenors or the president? Without clear guidelines, situations such as escalating wine prices due to a grape crop failure might be in the same category as people having to pay more for hand sanitizer (when they would be better off just thoroughly washing their hands anyway).

+1000