@ Sinon Unur, I think we’ve got a new OOTB here.

You want something. You don’t think it’s worth the price the supplier is charging. You have some alternatives: a) don’t buy it, don’t do anything; b) cry “price gouging”, “predatory behavior” and get politicians to steal the fruits of someone else’s efforts and give to you at supposedly a lower price.

Say what? Permitting some competition would actually solve the problem. There is such thing as a middle, you know. And what do you mean by “the fruits of someone else’s efforts?” Verizon is making very little effort because it has no incentive to. If some competitors came in, they’d have to raise their game or lose out to T-Mobile, etc.

(b) is not just lazy, but it reduces the incentives for, and usually even legal possibility of competitors entering an industry. When competitors do not enter the industry, you get interest groups fighting over some monopoly’s surplus, not market forces. We are still living with the repercussions of the regulatory barriers to entry in the telecom industry.

Which are…? Name one.

In a different context, for example, in a country where there is a food shortage, people who actually invested in food production, storage, distribution, actually get to make a windfall profit. If they can keep that profit, it gives others an incentive to invest in things like food production, storage, and distribution.

In every famine/shortage situation I know of, what happens is that some people either hoard food or interfere with distribution to drive up prices. You’re not really interested in the causes of famine and shortages, are you? It’s not as simple as you pretend.

However, in most instances, such as in the case of gas prices in the wake of Sandy, people start crying about “price gouging” and “predatory” behavior, and enlist politicians to steal other people’s property by not allowing prices to rise to reflect the shortfall in supply relative to demand. You get low prices on the signs, but no gas in the tank. You get low prices in the grocery stores, but no food to buy.

Please, for the love of God, STOP pretending there is such a thing as “the free market.” It’s a MYTH, damn it, and creating artificial shortages by hoarding is stealing the people’s money, if you want to look at it in terms of money/profit = property. The moment you intervene in the free exchange of goods and services by constricting supply or stimulating demand, the market is not free and pretending that it is causes the poverty and starvation you described earlier. Those “windfall profits” end up being spent on the other things that tend to run short in a crisis, so it’s only beneficial if you can hoard ALL of the necessities you require. Few of us can do that.

In the case of the poor country with a food shortage, rich, Western countries not only do not object to the destruction of the profits of productive people in such countries, they actively sabotage them by immediately dumping whatever surplus food, shoes, blankets etc their producers could not sell. Therefore, no one ends up having the incentive to actually make or distribute these things in times.

Now, now, you’re advocating that we “steal the fruits of someone else’s efforts” – in this case, those of people in rich, western countries. If over-supplying the market to drive prices DOWN is theft, what of the reverse? Why is under-supplying the market to take advantages of people’s needs NOT theft?

So, crying about “predatory behavior” and “price gouging” causes people to go without food, without gas etc.

Sorry – HOW does crying about “predatory behavior” and “price gouging” cause people to go without food, without gas etc.? Those things continue to be needed and in the case of the USA, they are abundant and compared to the rest of the world, quite cheap. So relatively few people go without food, gas, or the other things they need. Yes, there is poverty in the US, but there’s also food and gas.

In the case of telecoms, you must ask why these companies seem to be able charge the prices you do not like. Assuming they are making a boatload of economic profit as you seem to imply, why are other competitors not coming in? Why are people not coming up with providing alternative access methods?

Because, in many cases, they’ve made it so that THEY ALONE supply that particular service and actually ban competitors from entering the market. In some cases, this means that the will of the people is subordinated (when municipalities cannot set up broadband, for example) to that of the telco, in this case Verizon, though they’re not the only one that does it.

There is a simple answer: Barriers to entry in this industry, as in the case of taxicabs, and many other things, are backed by government power. It is not just FCC regulation. Patents, tax structures, etc also stand in the way potential entrants.

Uh, you’ve forgotten about the mergers and consolidation that keeps entrants out. That’s because the anti-trust laws we have on the books aren’t being enforced, as they should. That bit of government power would enable other entrants to compete.

So, if you want the telecom market to improve, think about how to bring in more competitors, not another granting another power to government bodies.

So, at the end of your confused Libertarian rant, we’re blaming the government for everything, but not the innocent-of-all-wrongdoing companies. As I’ve stated, when companies become too powerful by becoming too big to let other companies in, the exercise of government power to break them up via anti-trust laws is the answer.

As for your other complaint about under-pricing wrecking the economies of poorer countries, it’d solve the problem there because they wouldn’t have the buying power to flood foreign markets with cheap goods.