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Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

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Re: Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

#81

Post by mywittyname »

throaway46546 wrote: post #38
cascom wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that when companies do this, and then ask to be rewarded for making that investment, they are lambasted for price gouging or profiteering…just ask any hardware store that has sat on a pile of snow shovels through the summer in order to capture a premium price when a blizzard is approaching…

I agree price gouging laws lead directly to shortages. Take the recent toilet paper shortage. What is a more preferable outcome, not having toilet paper available or having to pay 4x as much for a roll? Because the latter is illegal we have empty shelves instead.

The problem with price gouging is that people are irrational and feel entitled to the price they paid last week. People get super fucking angry at price gougers. Which is how the nation ended up with these laws to begin with.

So even if the government were okay with "market adjustments" on basic goods, there would still be this risk of stores getting looted/destroyed because people are so angry at how quickly prices increased.

Businesses are much less emotional. Most are just going to adapt to the new price.

Re: Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

#82

Post by rsj_hn »

mywittyname wrote: post #81
throaway46546 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree price gouging laws lead directly to shortages. Take the recent toilet paper shortage. What is a more preferable outcome, not having toilet paper available or having to pay 4x as much for a roll? Because the latter is illegal we have empty shelves instead.

The problem with price gouging is that people are irrational and feel entitled to the price they paid last week. People get super fucking angry at price gougers. Which is how the nation ended up with these laws to begin with. So even if the government were okay with "market adjustments" on basic goods, there would still be this risk of stores getting looted/destroyed because people are so angry at how quickly prices…

It is more than just people being angry. As was famously pointed out by Axel Leijonhufvud, inflation makes the process of economic planning extremely difficult. If you are a business, you need to make long term production plans, and when you have no idea what the costs will be, that severly disrupts the production process and leads to shortages regardless of how you feel emotionally about something.

Instead of talking about "inflation", talk about "cost uncertainty". That should make clear how a complex society with long production chains can't really deal with it. That also includes households, who have much less capability for planning than firms and really need to know what their bills will be and how much things will cost when making decisions.

https://www.academia.edu/43768978/NOTES_ON_COSTS_AND_CONSEQU...

Re: Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

#83

Post by dragonwriter »

rsj_hn wrote: post #82
mywittyname wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with price gouging is that people are irrational and feel entitled to the price they paid last week. People get super fucking angry at price gougers. Which is how the nation ended up with these laws to begin with. So even if the government were okay with "market adjustments" on basic goods, there would still be this risk of stores getting looted/destroyed because people are so angry at how quickly prices…

It is more than just people being angry. As was famously pointed out by Axel Leijonhufvud, inflation makes the process of economic planning extremely difficult. If you are a business, you need to make long term production plans, and when you have no idea what the costs will be, that severly disrupts the production process and leads to shortages regardless of how you feel emotionally about something. Instead of talkin…

> inflation makes the process of economic planning extremely difficult.

It doesn't, though.

> If you are a business, you need to make long term production plans, and when you have no idea what the costs will be, that severly disrupts the production process

Sure, but that's the effect or unpredictable price changes, not inflation. USD is inflationary, Bitcoin is deflationary, but future (short or long term) prices of other goods and services in USD have a lot less uncertainty than those in Bitcoin. Inflation is not at all the same thing as difficulty projecting future prices.

Re: Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

#84

Post by mywittyname »

rsj_hn wrote: post #82
mywittyname wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with price gouging is that people are irrational and feel entitled to the price they paid last week. People get super fucking angry at price gougers. Which is how the nation ended up with these laws to begin with. So even if the government were okay with "market adjustments" on basic goods, there would still be this risk of stores getting looted/destroyed because people are so angry at how quickly prices…

It is more than just people being angry. As was famously pointed out by Axel Leijonhufvud, inflation makes the process of economic planning extremely difficult. If you are a business, you need to make long term production plans, and when you have no idea what the costs will be, that severly disrupts the production process and leads to shortages regardless of how you feel emotionally about something. Instead of talkin…

Inflation is not the same as price gouging.

Price gouging is a legal term for people/retailers taking advantage of shortages or spikes in demand by charging well over market price for basic necessities.

Re: Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

#86

Post by blix »

yunohn wrote: post #59
blix wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It’s quite natural, normal humans also don’t hoard everything they can possibly think of needing... For most of human history we did exactly that. The deeply interconnected "JIT Consumption" world is really quite new. And if consumption patterns suddenly change then you can't buy toilet paper anymore.

Do you have some sources to prove that “most of human history”, everyone was hoarding? Necessity leads to JIT, only in times of surplus can you even try to hoard. Famines were common before, and still occur now - you just don’t notice now thanks to globalization and in part, essential reserves maintained by governments and companies.

Humans very quickly realized that food doesn't always come in at a constant rate and learned to hoard[1] in times of plenty to protect against times of scarcity. As you note, current governments still stockpile food, but before power was so heavily centralized this responsiblity fell to smaller communities and family units. The very first proto-states formed around resource stockpiles[2], but food preservation had been a big deal for much longer, some 12k years ago[3], predating agriculture. In contrast, the expectation that I can go to Walmart and buy fresh ground beef at any time is not even a century old.

Neccesity leads to JIT, but also sustained surplus. If the winters are mild and food can grow year round, why bother stockpiling? If any widget can be obtained quickly and cheaply, why spend the extra effort to maintain inventory? If I can always buy ground beef at Walmart, why should I keep a winter's worth supply in my freezer? These practices are fine as long as the underlying assumptions remain valid. If one suddenly finds that they can't reliably buy toilet paper on demand, there is an incentive to hoard it. And that's exactly what happened.

[1] While it has taken on a somewhat different meaning in recent times, the early meaning of the word was 'to store and preserve for future use.' https://www.etymonline.com/word/hoard

[2] https://www.jstor.org/stable/44687105

[3] https://nchfp.uga.edu/publications/nchfp/factsheets/food_pre...

Re: Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

#87

Post by jdlshore »

margalabargala wrote: post #67
jdlshore wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a great thread, thank you. Do note that one of the replies calls his fundamental thesis into question, though: empties are sitting on chassis not due to regulation, but due to lack of equipment for stacking them higher.

Reasonably large mobile cranes exist and the cost of renting one for a day is small compared to the amount of capital bouncing around logistics operations surrounding the Port of LA. They're not currently in use at truck yards because it's illegal to stack containers high, but if it were no longer illegal then they could be quickly and temporarily set up.

There’s a respondent in the thread claiming that it’s not illegal, but I don’t know how accurate their information is.

Re: Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

#88

Post by duped »

mywittyname wrote: post #76
coliveira wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all momentary situation caused by the pandemic. In one year, people will not even remember this. Companies will not spend billions of dollars unless they have no other option.

I disagree. People will remember this and make irrational decisions based on these memories for years. For comparison, the Great Financial Crisis still looms over us so much that people still anticipate another huge housing burst. And when companies like Ford announce that they aren't using FICO scores to determine if a person qualifies for a loan, people on websites start fearmongering about another sub prime lendin…

Bold to predict that the supply shortages will be over in one year

Re: Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

#89

Post by verisimi »

coliveira wrote: post #70
azinman2 wrote: post #68

My hope is that supply chain issues will make clear the downsides to execs (not just the workers) and governments of externalizing all manufacturing abroad and out of reach. Look at the chaos caused by a pandemic, now imagine war or purposefully using supply chain as leverage.

This is all momentary situation caused by the pandemic. In one year, people will not even remember this. Companies will not spend billions of dollars unless they have no other option.

Do you remember 3 weeks to 'flatten the curve'? And its not over yet but we're 18 months in!

The virus, the treatment are transformational. They are the catalysts to technocratic governance.

Re: Paintmakers are running out of the color blue

#90

Post by labster »

verisimi wrote: post #89
coliveira wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all momentary situation caused by the pandemic. In one year, people will not even remember this. Companies will not spend billions of dollars unless they have no other option.

Do you remember 3 weeks to 'flatten the curve'? And its not over yet but we're 18 months in! The virus, the treatment are transformational. They are the catalysts to technocratic governance.

You make it sound like a bad thing. The curve was flattened, millions of lives were saved, and life goes on mostly as before.
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