(Please don't flame me for this...just trying to give others a different perspective.)
I'm not against "price gouging"...I studied Marketing, believe in supply and demand pricing and was also an Ebay Powerseller selling collectible toys for obscene amounts of money.
If demand suddenly goes nuts and prices aren't allowed to increase to meet, you get a few early ppl who hoard (point proven); however if price goes up to match demand...let's say tp doubles in price...then the same hoarder has less interest in buying 20 packs and more likely would buy 7. Then next thing you know, there's 3x the supply to help meet demand. Is this ethical for low income ppl? No, but look at our situation now...can those same ppl find any tp at all? Additionally, the crazy-high demand creates more underground price gouging MUCH worse than what you see online and thus further encourages those with connections to interrupt supply (like they work in a tp warehouse) to make an easy profit...this has a viscious cycle effect and the short supply continually feeds the frenzy.
Plus only the "lucky" ones or those willing to wait in line for a long time get the item and others who are sane shoppers don't.
Even with price control and limiting # available to each customer (something stores should've done from the start), demand still remains so high and people are so panicked it can take months to return to normal. Time to look for old newspapers/phone books/Sears catalogs.
BTW - I've argued with my wife over TP twice...I told her we should stock up before it's gone and she refused. I even have pics of fully stocked tp shelves at the Target by me. This was killing me since I'm a quasi-prepper. She would only let me buy 2 packs from each of the two stores we visited. She has since given me permission to say "I told you so".
I'm not against "price gouging"...I studied Marketing, believe in supply and demand pricing and was also an Ebay Powerseller selling collectible toys for obscene amounts of money.
If demand suddenly goes nuts and prices aren't allowed to increase to meet, you get a few early ppl who hoard (point proven); however if price goes up to match demand...let's say tp doubles in price...then the same hoarder has less interest in buying 20 packs and more likely would buy 7. Then next thing you know, there's 3x the supply to help meet demand. Is this ethical for low income ppl? No, but look at our situation now...can those same ppl find any tp at all? Additionally, the crazy-high demand creates more underground price gouging MUCH worse than what you see online and thus further encourages those with connections to interrupt supply (like they work in a tp warehouse) to make an easy profit...this has a viscious cycle effect and the short supply continually feeds the frenzy.
Plus only the "lucky" ones or those willing to wait in line for a long time get the item and others who are sane shoppers don't.
Even with price control and limiting # available to each customer (something stores should've done from the start), demand still remains so high and people are so panicked it can take months to return to normal. Time to look for old newspapers/phone books/Sears catalogs.
BTW - I've argued with my wife over TP twice...I told her we should stock up before it's gone and she refused. I even have pics of fully stocked tp shelves at the Target by me. This was killing me since I'm a quasi-prepper. She would only let me buy 2 packs from each of the two stores we visited. She has since given me permission to say "I told you so".