Nonsense. He who can destroy a thing, can control a thing.
Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
11–20 of 41 posts
Re: Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
#12The PoW camp example is interesting, but the way this article talks about risk and return makes no sense. The author gives an example of a lottery with a $1m prize, funded by selling 1 million tickets at $1 each, then introduces a "Mr. Behemoth" who can buy as many tickets as he wants. Since he can buy 600k tickets to win 400k, for a 66% return at 3:2 odds, or even 900k tickets to win 100k for an 11% return at 9:1 odds, the claim is that he "has complete control over risk and return."
...No? The expected value is 0 in either case.
.6 * 400 + .4 * (-600) = 0
.9 * 100 + .1 * (-900) = 0
The ability to slice a given risk-return profile into different pieces, or different amounts of leverage, is called "finance". But Mr. Behemoth in this case has the same expected return as everyone else, so the example has nothing to do with "control of supply and demand."
Re: Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
#13It shocks me that this article could be written without mentioning the phrase "price elasticity" a single time (a word I learned in a class literally numbered "econ 101").
In which paragraph do you think that phrase belongs?
> That “equlibrium” is an assumption that there are forces in the market that will moderate excess - that the market is self-balancing. This is the argument against regulation or government intervention.
> For example, it might be assumed that if supply shrinks, that prices will increase, which will reduce demand because fewer people can afford it, which will lead to a rebound in supply - which means prices will drop again. This seems intuitively correct.
About here would do it.
Economics terminology is important because it gives us a shared foundation for science and discussion.
So when people discuss economics but act like they have explored a novel concept that is economics 101, it tends to get mentioned.
Re: Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
#14It shocks me that this article could be written without mentioning the phrase "price elasticity" a single time (a word I learned in a class literally numbered "econ 101").
In which paragraph do you think that phrase belongs?
The title. Replace "control over supply and demand" with elasticity.
Re: Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
#15I'll never understand why people decide to blog about topics in which they don't have any background studies.
Re: Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
#16It shocks me that this article could be written without mentioning the phrase "price elasticity" a single time (a word I learned in a class literally numbered "econ 101").
The author has no background studies on economics.
Re: Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
#17> It’s very clear that large companies do abuse their market power (price-fixing and collusion) Can we get some examples of this? (not implying otherwise)
I think Amazon's "most favoured nation" clauses[1] qualify. Or deals like those between Amazon and Apple[2] that excluded third party sellers of Apple products from competing with Apple themselves.
Edit: Another example was the collusion between Canada's bread makers[3].
[1] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/05/amazon-sued-over...
[2] https://9to5mac.com/2022/11/09/apple-amazon-lawsuit-price-fi...
[3] https://financialpost.com/news/retail-marketing/why-the-hell...
Re: Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
#18Really interesting to see Dougald Lamont trending here on Hacker News: he was most recently the leader of Manitoba's Liberal party.
He lost his seat a few weeks ago in a provncial election where the party was reduced from three seats to one.
Re: Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
#19It shocks me that this article could be written without mentioning the phrase "price elasticity" a single time (a word I learned in a class literally numbered "econ 101").
The author has no background studies on economics.
I feel like even doing Wikipedia level reading on the topic should’ve been enough to stumble upon it though.
Re: Prices aren't just about supply and demand, but control over supply and demand
#20This is called friction.
It is part of the Supply & Demand model. Governments and other factors add friction which impact the elasticity of supply and demand curve.
Modern Capitalist societies are not pure, governments can drive friction through regulations, fees, taxes, codes, and a million other factors.