Just in Time for Halloween!

[paft.livejournal.com]

I suppose it’s appropriate that we get this truly scary, fanged, and drooling glimpse of the face of modern capitalism on October 31st. CNBC Senior Editor John Carney has decided to weigh in on the subject of price gouging during a disaster.

What’s striking is the bland cluelessness, a level of naivete that, feigned or not, borders on the murderous. After pointing out that, once a few of these layabouts experience having to pay, say, $100 for a case of bottled water, they’ll have received a salutary lesson in being prepared for disaster, Carney observes:

One objection is that a system of free-floating, legal gouging would allow the wealthy to buy everything and leave the poor out altogether. But this concern is overrated. For the most part, price hikes during disasters do not actually put necessary goods and services out of reach of even the poorest people. They just put the budgets of the poor under additional strain.

Right. The poor never have to do without “necessary goods and services” in normal times, so they certainly won’t have to do without them during disasters like floods and hurricanes! For the most part, anyway. And if a few poor people are unlucky enough not to be part of that “most,” seeing a few bodies of neighbors who’ve died from hypothermia or thirst will teach the rest of those lazy beggars a lesson about the dangers of overconsumption!

Carney apparently believes the plight of many people during a disaster is about dickering over prices rather than access to resources that could save lives. “This is a problem better resolved,” he declares, “through transfer payments to alleviate the household budgetary effects of the prices after the fact, rather than trying to control the price in the first place.”

Of course, this is only going to help those people who managed to survive in a "marketplace" where the prices of goods are jacked up to the point where they end up having to choose what live-saving goods to purchase. Potable water? Uncontaminated food? Dry warm blankets? Hey, if you can't afford all of them that's just now how the marketplace works, buddy, and if you or a member of your family ends up not making it because you chose wrong, those are the Randian breaks.

Surely the transfer payment you get later will compensate for having to watch them die.

But wait! There's more! Carney has followed this post up with another mentioning merchants giving away perishable goods, in which he asks:

Clearly, people could pay market prices for the perishing goods. Does the fact that they aren't mean consumers are gouging merchants? Should this be illegal?

Is this man from another planet?

*

Comments

[vitsli.livejournal.com]

>> In the days before a government safety net, people most certainly did die from lack of necessities.
The world has plenty examples of total "safety net" lack in the last 30 years - does any of these examples have terrible "die from lack of necessities" scenes?
Do you have a statistics of these deaths before the "net" was introduced? In the US in 1900, for example?
Also, it's nice to compare these deaths in the US and the countries with better and worse "safety net".
Logically, the death rate shall correlate with "safety net" cost and if it doesn't - proves you wrong.


Also, the government safety net shall be designed not to keep people in it but to push people out of it as soon as possible. Why does the government do all the opposite? The list of necessities expands, the cost of support rises, and people are unable to get even low-wage job even if they want to - who can afford $8 per hour for picking tomatoes or digging dirt?
These effects combined may, I'm afraid, create even more "poverty".

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Do you have a statistics of these deaths before the "net" was introduced? In the US in 1900, for example?

A study called "The Antipoverty Effect of Government Spending: Percent of All Persons Poor" (http://www2.hawaii.edu/~noy/300texts/poverty-comparative.pdf) suggests US social policies have reduced poverty by a significant amount, including Medicare and Social Security.

There is PLENTY of information comparing the United States to other countries efforts as well, with plenty of sourcing there. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare%27s_effect_on_poverty#cite_note-4) So your premise at the conclusion of your paragraph is wrong, I'm afraid.

[vitsli.livejournal.com]

Thanks, but that is not what I asked for.
Did I ask about "percent of all persons poor"? I didn't.

Since the argument was "death from lack of necessities" - I asked about the death rate before and after "net" introduction.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

And I answered it, albeit not in the black and white way you posed your initial question. But I answered it.

[vitsli.livejournal.com]

The question was about the death rate - which you didn't answer.
Q.e.d.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Sure, I did.

You just can't infer it from the sources I gave you. You've become hung up on the very specific way you framed your question originally, and made it an "either or" question, and can't seem to get past that. Paft's original comment you objected to was "In the days before a government safety net, people most certainly did die from lack of necessities." You doubted this, and asked for proof that social safety nets improved things. Necessities that would affect life span would include 1. food and 2. health care. You picked 1900 for some arbitrary reason, but the first social safety net programs didn't exist until the mid 1930s, and others like and Medicare and Medicaid didn't get enacted until the 1960s. Social programs in the United States have mitigated these (and are specifically discussed in the links I sourced originally, and are compared to other countries as well). And for what it's worth-- you wouldn't find statistics on death by starvation anyway (not in the United States), but people would instead die from causes related to malnourishment. So the way you framed the original question was wrong too.

This white paper looked at the effects of Depression government relief through social safety net programs unique to the period, (http://www.nber.org/papers/w8902.pdf?new_window=1) as measured against infant mortality and the fertility rate of women. Malnourishment would affect the health of women (women that are malnourished can't even ovulate) and babies.

So much of this is intuitive anyway, and judging from your glib comments on other threads (e.g. "so what if Paft gives money to Africa, there will always be poor people, so why bother trying!"), I don't think you're really serious, and are an ideologue.


T.e.D.

[vitsli.livejournal.com]

Your comment survived 6 or so editions... I appreciate the job you've done.

>> Sure, I did. You just can't infer it from the sources I gave you...
And for what it's worth-- you wouldn't find statistics on death by starvation anyway (not in the United States)...
So the way you framed the original question was wrong too...

Hmmm... So you've answered my question by referring to the source which has no information on _the_question_asked_, and the whitepaper you've mentioned is absent on that page...
Next, you acknowledge that you wouldn't find statistics on death by starvation anyway.
And your final conclusion is that my question is wrong, too - probably because you couldn't find the answer.

That is, one wouldn't find statistics on death by starvation anyway but yet you've answered my question... Pretty consistent.

Now you can explain Paft that the way she framed the original statement was wrong too - for exactly the same reasons.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

I appreciate the job you've done.

Anytime.

That is, one wouldn't find statistics on death by starvation anyway but yet you've answered my question... Pretty consistent.

You're welcome.

[paft.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

[paft.livejournal.com]

Looks like telemann beat me to the punch.

But then, someone who thinks Hurricane Katrina was a special effect like the dragons in a Tolkien film probably won't be convinced by the hard statistics telemann provided.