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Comment by nwah1 | Hacker News Reader

Yep. A much better way to alleviate shortages would be to suspend sales taxes.

Yep, here's that comment. Business benefit over direct customer benefit seems to be the manta these days.

I'm not sure how the parent thinks it will help with shortages, but sales tax adds to the price that the consumer pays. On sales tax holidays you see prices go down.

The problem, from what I saw, is hoarders having stock piled 17,000 hand sanitizers and the like, not official stores selling them for too high a price.

In a country of 300 million people, a few semi trucks worth of hoarding isn't doing much of anything to availability of any particular product.

It's the just-in-time nature of distribution. Demand doubles from "normal" and all of the sudden nothing is sitting on the shelf.

Which would be the case even without a sales tax?

However, while no sales tax on hand sanitizers is hardly going to be of a measurable impact for an individual, when you're hoarding to squeeze people in crisis, no sales tax makes for a nice 'bulk discount'.

I don't know what parent thinks, but if you suspend sales tax and keep the price the same, you suddenly earn much more. This increased profit incentivizes producers sending product to the area with shortages, and increasing production to send to that area.

As I commented below, I don't think someone saying "oh look, I saved 10 cents" is going to stop price gouging. As much use as a chocolate fire guard.

I don't think someone saying "oh look, I saved 10 cents" is going to stop price gouging. As much use as a chocolate fire guard.

Most stuff is bought by scalpers and sold on the black market anyway

It's not a black market if it's a market for legal goods, it's just a market.

Just not one where sales tax is paid I presume. It’s at least not part of the “formal economy” that will show up on a public profit and loss sheet.

Fun fact: one term for the informal economy is "System D": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_D

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