[lbo-talk] Meth and Monopoly (was Lumpen)

[Leigh Meyers]

Jim Devine wrote:
> On 1/25/06, Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1 at osu.edu> wrote:
>> Where there arises monopoly among those who commit crimes, it seems
>> to me that the state helps create it, by putting petty competitors
>> out of business.
> 
> this is one of those cases -- ignored by the econ. textbooks, natch --
> in which monopoly can be better than a competitive market. After all,
> monopoly prices discourage people from using meth.

Meth is dirt cheap, even a wino on the street can afford it.
E, X, whatever MDMA and all the other "designer" crank 
analogues are being called nowdays, are expensive and the 
realm of well to do college students & yuppies who
missed out on that other letter, "L".

The "state" makes big money on incarceration & the judicial proccess,
which in the case of cranksters is almost ALWAYS a "revolving-door",
not on the funding for the suppression of the drug trade... pin money
by comparision.

Leigh
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