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Comment by capableweb | Hacker News Reader

Well yeah, if you want as much money for the car as possible, then you'd do it like that. Personally when I sell stuff second-hand (which tends to be cars, computers, instruments and various accessories), I sell it to whoever is first and closest, in that order.

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Right. And I don't think we should fault dealers for wanting to make as much money as possible. They're a business after all.

I usually do the same when I sell stuff second-hand because my priority is getting rid of it as fast as possible, not to make the most money. Since dealers have very limited inventories these days, they should take more time to get a better price.

> They're a business after all.

I'd argue that using this phrase to write off wider ethical concerns is one of the key issues here.

Exactly.

Many people actually ”need” things, but always end up getting beaten by the person who has more $. It’s just constant battering of people that aren’t as well off as others. It’s often a disgusting system. The poor always suffer due to this “I’ll just hand wave to the ethics and talk about capitalism“.

Capitalism brought hundreds of millions out of abject poverty in the last thirty years. It has real consequences. The poor in the US have better living standards than half the planet and every opportunity to better except their own cultures holding them back. The left refuses to acknowledge or deal with this, creating generational poverty. What's not to blame is "capitalism".

You're making a few disingenuous claims.

Firstly, that it is illegitimate to criticise capitalism because it has created some benefits. As if we're not even allowed to dream of system reform because we're currently doing better than other countries. Very little social or economic progress would be made if we all thought like this.

Secondly, that those benefits are purely due to unadulterated capitalism. In reality, Western countries follow a mixture of capitalist, statist, and socialist policies. The poor in the US have seen improvements because of the minimum wage, anti-trust regulations, and various social safety nets combined with economic growth.

Thirdly, that the only thing holding other countries back is "their own cultures". This ignores widespread, long-term destabilising interference by Western countries in Africa, the Middle East, South Asia and South America.

Capital markets are really great at some things, and really bad at others. Treating them as a one-size-fits-all solution for our problems is inefficient and dogmatic. We end up coupling our moral values with the system we use to try to enforce said values

How raising pricies is unethical? We are talking about somewhat luxury goods here - new cars.

People who can no longer buy the new car will instead buy a lower priced car, encouraging an upward trend in general car prices.

And then manufacturers will increase supply and prices will go down.

I am fairly open to the argument that price gouging for necessities in times of sudden life threatening crunch is not ok, but car market is operating like a normal market.

Except that, in this case, chip shortages and a supply-chain crisis mean that supply won't increase.

Then the market is acting rationally and allocating limited goods to the highest bidder. Prices would go down if the population stopped purchasing at the given prices. But all it takes is one person to buy at a price just above yours to keep you out of the market.

I'm not arguing against the dynamics of the current economic system. I'm challenging whether "that's business after all" is a sound ethical defense of a decision to raise new car prices in this climate.

You could just as easily claim that industry consolidation is "rational" because it the people making the deals make a lot of money, but the overall effect is often bad for society.

And this one is not because there are enough cars in the US and even if currently no new are produced - existing are rarely decommissioned because they no longer work.

Very few people need new car now. Or need to change their car now. It is a flexible market. In the current market supply shortage means that you will have to squeeze 50000 more miles out of your current car in the next two years. It's not insulin or baby formula.

A ~30% spike in used car prices which has been ongoing for a year and is predicted to continue for 2-3 years is bad for people that need a car to commute and can't easily afford to buy another if and when theirs breaks down.

Maybe you're right and this is a fraction of a percentage of the population. I'd be surprised but am open to seeing stats on it.

That's just wrong. About 5% of cars are scrapped every year. Many people need to buy a replacement vehicle on short notice because their old car suffers a catastrophic mechanical failure, or is totalled in a collision.

> And then manufacturers will increase supply and prices will go down.

Will they? It seems like scarcity pricing is becoming a more and more common strategy.

This would then leave room open for competitors to move in and price lower to move more units. Ultimately things are set to MR = MC in the long run.

It's the only way for businesses to not completely collapse and still meet Agenda 2030 goals of reducing emissions worldwide. I personally think that the supply chain crises will be a boon to energy and emissions reduction worldwide. That not everyone will be able to afford a big car and such, well, they'll have to adapt.

Then all the cars will be bought by scalpers and resold for much more, just as it happened with GPUs.

Sure, Because it’s not your core business

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