Yesterday some dude posted a video to shame apparently Indian gas station owners charging $10 a gallon around the Hurricane Helene disaster area. The lolberts answered with rebuttals that free market pricing is the best rationing mechanism in a time of scarcity.
People are saying that the gas station could ration gallons per customer and keep the same price, and the lolberts are saying this is communist price control.
I'm not really sure how much merit is held by either position since I've never really thought about this with respect to a disaster area. Clearly the 1973 price controls were a bad idea, but this is a debate over what a private business owner should do after a hurricane. My gut feeling is that gas should be rationed by customer, not by pricing. But maybe the gas station is passing along supply chain pricing to a certain extent?
edit: Texas punished gas price gouging in 2019 after Hurricane Harvey.
The higher prices would incentivise people to ship that stuff in, ending the crisis sooner. Price controls prolong the crisis, there’s nothing to be gained by bringing it in.
I don’t like it being a foreigner doing so, but the theory is sound.
It isn't being shipped in because the roads are impassible.
Your jewish logic is if there's 50 life jackets on a sinking ship holding 100 people, that it's okay to auction them off because it will incentivize someone manufacturing more. Except the ship is sinking. You aren't getting more.