Venezuela suffering through meat and sugar shortages

[John Kilduff]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Maybe eventually the black market will become the de facto market for all these goods and the whole scheme will collapse?

[/ QUOTE ]

Even if the black market is chugging along merrily, the large cost of risk of being imprisoned or killed for participating still prevents it from operating as a surrogate for a real free market.

[/ QUOTE ]

The increased risks inherent in black markets drive up prices. A similar principle is at work as in the illegal drug markets.

[mosdef]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Maybe eventually the black market will become the de facto market for all these goods and the whole scheme will collapse?

[/ QUOTE ]

Even if the black market is chugging along merrily, the large cost of risk of being imprisoned or killed for participating still prevents it from operating as a surrogate for a real free market.

[/ QUOTE ]

The increased risks inherent in black markets drive up prices. A similar principle is at work as in the illegal drug markets.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, but that risk/cost is added to the equation through violent government means, so it's an imposition on the "free" market the same way that the government price controls are.

[IsaacW]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Maybe eventually the black market will become the de facto market for all these goods and the whole scheme will collapse?

[/ QUOTE ]

Even if the black market is chugging along merrily, the large cost of risk of being imprisoned or killed for participating still prevents it from operating as a surrogate for a real free market.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree, and I didn't intend for my original statement to be an optimistic one. Price controls are very, very bad if they set a maximum price that is too low.

Incidentally, I really like the idea in Economics in One Lesson that all of these things come about because people consider only the primary consequences of an action and don't look deep enough into the problem.

[BCPVP]

If you like Economics in One Lesson, you might also like Frederic Bastiat's, That Which is Seen and That Which is Not Seen

[Al68]

[ QUOTE ]
If you like Economics in One Lesson, you might also like Frederic Bastiat's, That Which is Seen and That Which is Not Seen

[/ QUOTE ]
That's the same guy who predicted that if polititians continued to collect taxes to fund their social programs ("pillage"), eventually they would even evolve a "moral code that glorifies pillage". Sound like anyone we know of?

[Zeno]

So Hugo is not turning out to be a wise economist.

Is that a fair statement?

Perhaps we should give this man more time to prove his economic agenda. Whatever it is.

-Zeno

[Borodog]

Shall we have a pool on when the mass killings begin?

[natedogg]

[ QUOTE ]
Shall we have a pool on when the mass killings begin?

[/ QUOTE ]

It's not mass killings, you capitalist propogandist dog. It's the Ministry of Truth's "relocation" program.

natedogg

[lehighguy]

I can't really give you a time, because I can't predict the price of a barrel of crude. But as soon as it dibs low enough I can guarantee it.