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.
In disaster situations like this one if this gas station owner's body were found in a ditch with his skull caved in the police if they're even around wouldn't give it a second glance over the hundreds of dead bodies in ditches they've already seen.
Under those extraordinary circumstances different substitution effects (eg. killing/robbing the owner and taking the gas may be "cheaper" than just paying for the gas) are in play, and a useful economic model needs to take them into account.
Yeah like just paying $10 for some emergency gas