> "We urge retailers to behave responsibly throughout the coronavirus outbreak and not to make misleading claims or charge vastly inflated prices,"
Urging retailers isn't going to stop the train of capitalism. I applaud their optimism, though.
And there the idealism breaks down. Willing to pay more - which you always are if it becomes a life-or-death situation - does not mean able to pay more; able to pay more does not mean deserves it more.
Yes, but what's a good allocation metric for 'deserves' ? It's not an easily quantifiable metric.
Limits are legal, but sufficiently desperate people will do what it takes to get around them. A major component of the problem here is that neither you nor these stores can take their normal day-to-day experiences and apply them to black swan events like this. Your System 1 (bleh, what a terrible name that is....) heuristics are lying to you; you need to engage System 2 for this. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking,_Fast_and_Slow