[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by GA Russell

Once more into the breach!

1) "Do you then assume that luxury goods like Ferraris should not be made, because they are not affordable by the wider market?"

Are you referring to what is legal? I have never suggested that money grubbing should be illegal. I just think that it is legitimate to point it out when it occurs.

Would you be kind enough to answer the question I asked?

We disagree on what classifies as money grubbing, and I suspect we'll continue to do so. I'm trying to nail down the context in which we disagree.

2) ""Bean counters" do what the name implies. They count the beans. It isn't normally their job to make the decisions you might count as "money grubbing" - only to provide the information on which the folks who do make those decisions base their judgments."

No point in quibbling over slang. I have often seen the decision makers of corporations referred to as bean counters. I think that typically they are the corporations whose CEO is a former CFO. I've often seen such references to the management of the record companies in comparison to the management of the record companies of fifty years ago.

You're referring to cases where the CEO came from the finance side, rather than the sales and marketing, operations, product development or other areas. of the enterprise. But even they aren't all "bean counters" in a pejorative sense.

I can think of classic cases of CEOs coming from the financial track damaging their business because they saw everything in terms of numbers, but didn't clearly grasp what the numbers meant. The numbers are simply measurements, and are meaningless unless you understand what is being measured and why it's measured that way.

It's a particularly pernicious problem in organizations which depend upon creativity. I'm not especially fond of the management of DisneyCo for that reason. Walt Disney was a genius, who just wanted to tell stories and entertain people. He did so very well indeed, and became rich and famous as a result, founding an enterprise which is now a global institution.

The current management are bean counters, who seem to see the world in terms of "How can we make a lot of money?", not "How can we tell a wonderful story that will entertain millions of people?" They put the cart before the horse, and are less likely to actually tell wonderful stories that will entertain millions of people in consequence.

3) "Right now, the US economic system is a modified form of capitalism, and I don't see that changing. What "ism" would you substitute?"

Patricia posted for me some works on Distributism earlier this year. AJ Penty, GK Chesterton and Hillaire Belloc. Also Rerum Novarum. I'd like to see how those ideas could be implemented in the US.

I'll respond to this in a separate post, as it's a complex topic.

4) "What happens when "sufficient profit to remain a going concern" results in prices you don't like and consider price gouging?"

Then it's not price gouging. I've never said that just because I think a price is too high for me it should be considered gouging.

I fear your comments can be read that way. You have been objecting to prices and calling them price gouging.

What would I do? I would lower my fee to make it affordable for the population. But that's my moral code. I wouldn't price gouge.

How low? And what would make you decide your rate was "unaffordable by the population"? A single complaint by someone who didn't like your quoted rate?

What if what people wanted was a rate low enough to dramatically reduce your income and leave you unable to pay your bills?

6) "Pricing is what the market will bear, and the market bears that price."

Not to put too fine a point on it, but the price reflects what the publisher thinks he can get for it. The publisher may be wrong. In the real world, the publisher does not necessarily lower the price to maximize his profit. Competency cannot be assumed, particularly when there is a monopoly on the product such as a specific book title.

Agreed, all pricing reflects what the seller assumes they can get. If they can't get it, they have to make adjustments or go out of business. If enough people will pay the asked price to let them make money and stay in business, guess what? The market will bear it.

Correct me if I misread you, but it appears to me that you believe that what the market decides is just. For example, you would consider the price which maximizes the publisher's profit to be just, even if it were too high for the general public, wouldn't you? As I've stated elsewhere (above, I think), we have in the US a public policy of encouraging everyone to read, and a price point which limits books to the well to do violates that public policy. I would consider such a price to be unjust. Particularly in the case of books which are "classics", which you say Catch-22 is.

No, I think the market decides what it will pay. "Just" is a matter of viewpoint.

7) "Most of discussions like this stem from unhappiness that the ebook issued at the same time as the hardcover carries a higher price than the mass market paperback edition that will follow."

I've never had a problem with high eBook prices for brand new books.

It does appear to me that the Agency 5 have colluded to fix prices, however, because I understand that all of their eBooks of their new best sellers have the same price ($12). The posts here complain about the price point, but what concerns me is that it is the same for all five Agency publishers. I suspect collusion.

I don't believe this is collusion in the sense you're thinking of. The Agency Model redefines the relationship between Amazon and the publishers. The publishers are not selling ebooks to Amazon at a specified discount, with Amazon then free to offer the product at whatever price they like, accepting a lower margin or even taking a loss on each sale. Under the Agency Model, Amazon becomes the agent for the publisher, selling the book at a defined price, and getting a defined commission on the sale, specified by contract.

Five of the Big 6 publishers agreed that the Agency Model was an appropriate response to Amazon. (The sixth, Random House, did not.)

They aren't colluding on pricing. All large publishers charge roughly the same amount for books, because all have similar cost structures and revenue and profit targets. Nobody will want to be the first to raise prices, for fear of losing market share to lower priced competitors, but no one is going to cut prices across the board, either. They probably don't have the cushion to do that safely.

8) "If I'm willing to wait a bit, the chances are good my library can get something for me."

That's great news for you! You live in New York City, don't you? That scenario has never been my experience.

I do live in New York city, with a branch the the NYC public library around the corner from me, and the main library within walking distance. But your library should be able to process an inter library loan request for a title they don't happen to have. Is this not the case where you are?
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Dennis