A gas station in Richmond, VA, charged $6.99 per gallon of gas yesterday when people flooded to get gas because of a feared, impending shortage. One woman getting gas called the high price “ridiculous.” [Breitbart]
Ridiculous — by what standard? Economically, prices (absent government controls) are set by supply and demand. Any time demand for a product rises massively while supply remains the same, you will see a spike in prices. If the government came in and froze the prices while demand rose and supply remained the same, you would find shortages and long lines. That’s what happened in the 1970s with long gas lines and shortages. When the government repealed price controls in the early 1980s, the gas lines went away.
So it’s not “ridiculous” that gas prices are going up. It’s logically inevitable. If you think it’s immoral that prices rise, when supply cannot keep up with demand, then you will get bread lines, gas lines and waiting lines for everything else where prices are controlled. That’s because gas doesn’t come into existence out of thin air; SOMEBODY HAS TO PRODUCE AND MARKET IT. Pain and suffering: That’s what you call “morality” will get you.
Most Americans are CLUELESS about morality and economics. They want the great efficiency and prosperity that capitalism (economic freedom) produces but they also want it cheap. And they want business owners to be something they are NOT prepared to be in their own lives: completely selfless. These poor mask-wearing, CNN-watching, Democratic Communist-voting fools think we can curtail and (within 10 years, as Biden and others promise) eliminate oil production without consequences. Wow, is that ignorant!
If I didn’t have to suffer and live through the shortages and pain I know we will increasingly see under the expansion of socialism in this country, I would frankly find it entertaining and socially just to see the millions of smug, ignorant fools who keep voting for it have to suffer too. The Colonial gas crisis of the last day or two? Under socialism and one-party rule, and as capitalism enters its twilight, you can expect a HELL of a lot worse.
Follow Dr. Hurd on Facebook. Search under “Michael Hurd” (Rehoboth Beach DE). Get up-to-the-minute postings, recommended articles and links, and engage in back-and-forth discussion with Dr. Hurd on topics of interest. Also follow Dr. Hurd on Twitter at @MichaelJHurd1, @DrHurd on Gab, drmichaelhurd on Instagram and @Drhurd on Parler.