The ethics of the resale

Discussion in 'Marketplace Discussions' started by hbbfam, Apr 15, 2014.

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  1. Avenging Robot

    Avenging Robot Senior Member

    I'm not going to enter any debates here over supply and demand.

    Philosophy of the World by the Shaggs on Third World is rare. Less than 1000 copies pressed and 900 of them stolen.

    The Butcher album is not rare. It seems rare because it makes idiots like me drool whenever we see one and we must have it and have it now. Therefore it goes for good money and supply seems tight.

    Buying something on RSD to flip for a quick profit is risky but can make a quick buck if you're lucky and choose correctly (glow in the dark Ghostbusters as exhibit A here please) I suppose.

    However, I think panicking because you didn't find something you wanted on RSD and buying it on eBay the next day for 5 times what you would have paid in-store is beyond stupid. If you go to your local record store about once a week, it'll show up in later shipments, 90% of the time.
     
    Last edited: Jul 28, 2014
  2. :righton:
    Before feeling guilty about making a profit, decide for yourself whether or not the buying public would sympathize if you'd paid more than an item is now worth and would make up the difference. :biglaugh:
     
    EasterEverywhere and ivan_wemple like this.
  3. paulisme

    paulisme I’m being sarcastic

    Location:
    Charleston SC
    No, what you've described IS the free market. The free market isn't something divine and holy, it's a system that people will inevitably abuse to the detriment of a society's moral and ethical beliefs. Free markets allow for sale of human organs, people, or any other thing at any price because the only laws in play are supply and demand. That's why practically every government places restrictions on the free market. What you're talking about is a regulated market created within the confines of a society's moral and ethical beliefs.
     
    Imagine70 likes this.
  4. Sneaky Pete

    Sneaky Pete Flat the 5 and That’s No Jive

    Location:
    NYC USA
    Yes, Greed is one of the BIG 7 Deadly Sins.

    I agree, greed is a major problem in our society. It is fed by the false religion of Free Market Economics and Business as a panacea for all of the World's ills.
     
    zongo and Sandinista like this.
  5. Technocentral

    Technocentral Forum Resident

    Location:
    Dublin, Ireland
    Its pure greed and they are parasites, they have outpriced me and other real music lovers out of gigs and vinyl purchases, I'd put them on a par with Orson Welles' character in "The Third Man". :realmad:
     
  6. Technocentral

    Technocentral Forum Resident

    Location:
    Dublin, Ireland
    Now here's Jim with the weather!!
     
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  7. sons of nothing

    sons of nothing Forum Resident

    Location:
    Illinois
    nothing wrong with selling stuff at higher prices. Take gold. I bought some in 2001 for bout 250.00 per oz, and sold it recently for around 1400.00 oz.


    same deal with music. there are people who buy and sell because they can make money off it. ANYONE who objects to paying
    more for something than the original cost, inflation not included, should avoid buying a home, a car, gold, a guitar, or even a record.

    and whomever bitches about this, and does it themselves is the ultimate douche.
     
    Rhett likes this.
  8. This is absurd! Human slavery is something entirely different from the free market. It should not be compared in any way with buying and selling music. People do not normally become slaves by selling themselves voluntarily.
     
  9. Technocentral

    Technocentral Forum Resident

    Location:
    Dublin, Ireland
    There is more than the original cost and 20 times or more the cost, big difference, and gold isnt like music, every bit is like the other bit and you arent going to deny someone their own by buying it, false analogy.
     
    Last edited: Jul 28, 2014
    Sneaky Pete likes this.
  10. watchnerd

    watchnerd Forum Resident

    Location:
    Seattle
    No ethical problem at all with people making a profit from collectibles.

    A given album from a given band is a "nice to have" for anyone, not a subsistence item.

    No more ethically worse than wine or art or comic book collecting.
     
    Rhett likes this.
  11. paulisme

    paulisme I’m being sarcastic

    Location:
    Charleston SC
    Again, you're thinking of a regulated market constrained by people who view slavery and human trafficking an abomination of human rights (which is a relatively new concept; 200 years ago slavery was considered legal by the regulated market in America). A free market makes no judgment on the goods being sold.
     
    Imagine70 likes this.
  12. We do not interfere with the free market in slavery by regulating prices. We just ban human slavery. This has absolutely nothing whatever to do with the free market or regulation of commerce.
     
  13. Ctiger2

    Ctiger2 Senior Member

    Location:
    US
    lots of complete rubbish in this thread.

    If it wasn't for some people buying something that is limited supply and making it available at X price then there wouldn't even be any supply.

    Would you rather have no supply at any price OR have a limited supply at X price? If the "supply" we're referring to is a life's necessity like food/air/water then I could see how a person might get angry. Beyond that...
    The US economy is probably 5% "free-market". Heck, "money" aka currency is 1/2 of every financial transaction and the value of said "money" is dictated by a few people who work in a public/private (read fascist) central bank. The only "free-market" in the US is essentially in aspects of Technology and Entertainment. That's why you see massive innovation in those markets comparatively.
     
    muffmasterh likes this.
  14. kwadguy

    kwadguy Senior Member

    Location:
    Cambridge, MA
    If you assert that people shouldn't be able to buy something and sell it for more than they paid, then you should also be willing to allow anyone to come to your house and buy anything you own (including your house) for what you paid for it--or to have it for free if you got it for free. Are you?
     
    Rhett and starduster like this.
  15. paulisme

    paulisme I’m being sarcastic

    Location:
    Charleston SC
    Yes, it does. By making the sale of something illegal, it's placing restrictions on a free market and creating a regulated market. You appear to have a definition of "free market" that economists do not share.
     
    Imagine70 likes this.
  16. Whatever. Is murder for hire also a part of the free market economy? Just like selling music for what someone is willing to pay for it? :rolleyes:
     
    Last edited: Jul 28, 2014
  17. Raunchnroll

    Raunchnroll Senior Member

    Location:
    Seattle
    The degree of rip off is inversely proportional to the quantity of government printed money the buyer wants to avoid parting with.
     
  18. paulisme

    paulisme I’m being sarcastic

    Location:
    Charleston SC
    I don't know how we got to comparing human atrocities with the selling of music. There were posts in this thread saying that people buying music with the intent to resell at a higher prices was not the free market at work but was somehow a perversion of the free market. My point was that a free market makes no judgements based on ethics or morality. If one decides that the practice is unacceptable, one cannot use free market economics to demonstrate it. A code of ethics or morality agreed upon by a community is sufficient, but those exist outside the economic principles of supply and demand.
     
  19. You were the one who brought up human slavery and organ selling in a thread about music buying and selling.
     
  20. paulisme

    paulisme I’m being sarcastic

    Location:
    Charleston SC
    Right, as examples of how morality and ethics are not part of economics. It seems that for some reason you want to conflate that into "selling music = slavery."
     
    Rhett likes this.
  21. No I don't. I made a mistake in responding to your original post comparing selling music with slavery, but I will have no more dialog with you.
     
  22. Chris_G

    Chris_G Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Los Angeles, CA
    There is nothing immoral or unethical about buying low and selling high. I search craigslist nationwide for MiniDisc items, such as pre-recorded MiniDisc albums, blank MiniDiscs, or MiniDisc recorders or Hi-MD recorders. I look for those items that are rare and of great value, but the craigslist seller is selling it for cheap, simply because he/she just wants to get rid of it or they just don't know what MiniDisc is, or they don't want to deal with Ebay themselves. So i buy stuff, really good stuff at low prices, and I post them up on Ebay. I have no interest in keeping the majority of the items i buy, it's all for resale to make some extra cash. Honestly, if you want to buy and keep rare items but buy them at low prices, then you should be the one to be searching online for them. Those who search and find them, have to right to either keep them or sell them off. Last week I bought almost 200 new recordable MiniDiscs on craigslist for a total of $83. I have put some of them on ebay and I'm easily going to make my money back just on those few MiniDiscs that for some reason are rare and are fetching $30+ for each disc. They are worth, what buyers are willing to pay.
     
    Rhett likes this.
  23. tmtomh

    tmtomh Forum Resident

    I would agree with this, but add one important caveat: paulisme is correct about the concept of the free market. However, when we come to reality and history, there is no such thing as a free market, primarily because some sort of government - that is, an entity with a monopoly on the legitimate use of force - has to exist in order to create the social and legal conditions necessary for a market to exist. Now, one can say, "The enforcement of contract isn't what I mean by a regulated market," but in that case one is simply trying to cherry pick what counts as regulated.

    Government regulates markets, but it also creates the conditions for their existence. And government doesn't regulate only for ethical or moral reasons. It also regulates because "free" markets have characteristics that tend to make them unsustainable, and/or destructive of other markets. And the question of whether or not to allow some markets to destroy others can never be answered within the logic of the market.

    Finally, the idea of the free market also is limited by the role of human buyers and sellers. Supply and demand are never perfect. People have prejudices, non-market priorities and goals, imperfect information, and not entirely rational value-maximizing strategies that all make the actual practice of supply and demand a bit like a 12th-generation analogue copy of the theoretical law of supply and demand. :) And to return to the topic of this thread, I would suggest that exploiting these imperfections in the reality of supply and demand has been a source of much more profit over the centuries than the actual following of the law of supply and demand.

    Or to put it another way, throughout history many of the capitalists who have trumpeted the virtues of a pure market, have in fact made their fortunes by exploiting (or creating) market distortions.
     
  24. sons of nothing

    sons of nothing Forum Resident

    Location:
    Illinois
    I'm not too sure it is a false analogy, but I respect your opinion. Is this to say a butchered butcher cover is worth more than one in mint, or vg?

    Same with gold, coins in particular. A high grade double eagle will always be worth more that one destined to go in the melt pile.
     
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