Comment Wait, what? (Score 3, Insightful) 21
Wait, what? A web site can secretly access my browser history? Why does this need the FTC need to get involved, shouldn't "we" stop them by fixing the browsers?
Wait, what? A web site can secretly access my browser history? Why does this need the FTC need to get involved, shouldn't "we" stop them by fixing the browsers?
What's NASA trying to hide? It looks to me like they're a bunch of terrorists...
They are only asking for your email address so that they can sell it to spammers and spam you themselves.
Use http://www.mailinator.com/ and thwart their evil plans...
Why not just use a paper ballot marked with a pencil? Everyone knows how to use them, they are cheap and readily available and one person can count them up in a couple of minutes.
... on their own list?
Considering that many of the labourers I work with (construction industry) have difficulty figuring out quarter, eighth or sixteenths of a inch on a measuring tape -- I'm very hard pressed to give any credence to the idea that we should be teaching less math in school.
Both underwriters and car dealerships purchase in structured deals with contractual boundaries that set wholesale pricing structures.
So it's not scalping because of the collusion? BTW: Car dealers will not hesitate to sell a car above sticker price (at a premium) if there is a big demand for it.
Scalpers are people who buy something at retail, turn around and sell it at retail for a huge markup, preventing other retail purchasers from buying at the merchant-set rate and intentionally causing scarcity issues. Think tickets for concerts, or the shortages of Wiis and PS3s when those first released.
What you have just described are free enterprisers who are exercising their rights to make a profit in a free enterprise system.
BTW: They are not creating a scarcity of the item in question, they are taking advantage of the scarcity -- there is a common economic term that covers this, "supply and demand". They aren't doing anything commodity traders don't do.
People who were willing to buy at the set price get blocked out, and the venue ends up with empty seats.
So what you're saying is the retailer has under-priced the item they are selling and someone else is risking their capital in order to capitalise on that. What's the problem with that?
Car dealers and stock underwriters on the other hand, have every incentive to sell every item they purchase.
"Scalpers" have the exact same incentive to sell every item that they purchase that a car dealer or stock underwriter does -- profit.
Unlike scalpers, they are providing a benefit to their service by organizing distribution and sales channels. In these situations, the original product source (IPO, factory) doesn't want to sell direct, they prefer to sell wholesale and let someone else take on that responsibility. Scalpers on the other hand are simply injecting themselves as an additional layer post-retail and do not add any value with their service.
As a consumer I don't give a rat's ass what service a wholesaler provides to the manufacturer. I only care what service they provide to me and scalpers provide a very valuable service. They allow people who are willing to pay for the privilege, to buy tickets to shows (for example) at their convenience.
The moon is made of green cheese. -- John Heywood