Michael Giberson As the chart below shows, during the summer of 2008 gasoline prices in Anchorage, Alaska switched from following typical prices in the lower 48 to a modest but notable amount above such typical prices. Not shown, but you can check it out at Gasbuddy.com where I generated the chart, after the summer of …
Are Refiners and Wholesalers Price Gouging on Petroleum Products in Alaska? Read More »
Michael Giberson If you follow price gouging headlines, you become accustomed to seeing price gouging stories around big sports events: the Rugby World Cup, NASCAR races, NCAA basketball finals, and always the Olympics (a selection: Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1996, Sydney 2000, Salt Lake City 2002, Athens 2004, Vancouver 2010, London 2012, and finally this extreme example). All of …
Michael Giberson It sounds kind of funny to say the New York Attorney General wants to prohibit business-related reasoning in gasoline wholesaling. After all, gasoline wholesaling is a business activity and generally business-related reasoning would be entirely appropriate. It sounds like asking a court not to act on law-related reasoning or asking a politician not to …
Michael Giberson If you think political interference in gasoline markets is excessive, try reading about drug pricing for a while. From the Los Angeles Times: “Shortage of cancer drugs tied to simple economics, experts say.” And by “simple economics” they mean the perverse incentives created by government regulation that induce oncologists to prefer prescribing more …
Michael Giberson In a post at the Master Resource blog I point out another problem with anti-price gouging laws: during actual emergency conditions both state governments and consumers likely have much more important things to do that worry about whether particular price increases are unconscionable under the state’s understanding of that term. Among other points, …
Price Gouging Laws Wasted Resources During the Hurricane Irene Emergency Read More »
Michael Giberson Wisconsin didn’t have an anti-price gouging law in 2001, so the state government’s response to post-9/11 reports of gasoline price gouging was pretty limited. While the Wisconsin governor called for an investigation of gasoline retailers, for all practical purposes the investigation was limited to fighting collusion in price setting and instances in which stations …
Michael Giberson The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, created a great deal of uncertainty and fear among Americans. In the retail gasoline market, some (but not all) consumers reacted to the uncertainty and fear by heading to a gas station to fill up their tanks. Some (but not all) gasoline retailers reacted to the …
Post 9/11 Gasoline Price Gouging in Wisconsin: Two Views Read More »
Michael Giberson Gasoline stations are violating price regulations at a higher rate than any other industry under government price guidelines, an Internal Revenue Service survey shows. About 20% of service stations checked were selling gasoline above the legal ceiling price, the agency said. Federal energy chief William Simon told The Milwaukee Journal’s Washington Bureau Thursday …
Michael Giberson Congressman Brian Higgins, of western New York, put out a press release last week welcoming the news that the Obama administration will release 30 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. (“Higgins Welcomes News of Oil Release: Congressman Called for Gas Relief Measure in April.”) The rest of the press release was a …
Michael Giberson Art Carden, in his Economic Imagination blog at Forbes.com, explains “Price Gouging Laws Hurt Storm Victims.” How many people see natural disasters like the tornadoes in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and Joplin, Missouri and say “we should be working to impede the recovery and make life harder for storm victims?” Probably no one. How many …
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