Adam Smith famously said "The price of a thing is what it will bring" -- or words to that effect.
So I haven't any meaningful cavil with anyone who wishes to sell, at mark-ups of several orders of magnitude for bags of Penzance or other Esoterica blends they happen to finagle, hoard, stockpile, couch, or otherwise snap up -- not because they care for the stuff, but because they plan to broker for and re-sale. I wish them every joy of it -- buyer and seller, both. No laws are broken. Up anchor, all debts paid, and no regrets.
But -- speaking strictly for myself, imploring no man to join me, impugning no man who thinks otherwise -- I'll be buggered into a cocked hat if I'll play that game from either side of the table.
When and if I stumble across another bag of Penzance someday from from a real seller, at the reasonable and widely set retail price, I might buy it. But, until then, I'll decline the dubious privilege of paying 4- and 5- and more-times the manufacturer's going rate to them as has. And when I buy, I'll buy the bag I plan to smoke and share. I'll forego the chance to buy the shelves clean gouging, er, satisfying the market (also known as my fellow pipe smokers). Sure I might make -- golly -- scores of dollars doing so. But then I'd have that taste in my mouth.
Adam Smith said "the price of a thing is what it will bring." True that. But some old Wall Street stalwart, his identity lost to us, known only to the ages, said another true thing:
"Bulls make money; bear make money; but hogs get slaughtered."
Here endeth the lesson.
So I haven't any meaningful cavil with anyone who wishes to sell, at mark-ups of several orders of magnitude for bags of Penzance or other Esoterica blends they happen to finagle, hoard, stockpile, couch, or otherwise snap up -- not because they care for the stuff, but because they plan to broker for and re-sale. I wish them every joy of it -- buyer and seller, both. No laws are broken. Up anchor, all debts paid, and no regrets.
But -- speaking strictly for myself, imploring no man to join me, impugning no man who thinks otherwise -- I'll be buggered into a cocked hat if I'll play that game from either side of the table.
When and if I stumble across another bag of Penzance someday from from a real seller, at the reasonable and widely set retail price, I might buy it. But, until then, I'll decline the dubious privilege of paying 4- and 5- and more-times the manufacturer's going rate to them as has. And when I buy, I'll buy the bag I plan to smoke and share. I'll forego the chance to buy the shelves clean gouging, er, satisfying the market (also known as my fellow pipe smokers). Sure I might make -- golly -- scores of dollars doing so. But then I'd have that taste in my mouth.
Adam Smith said "the price of a thing is what it will bring." True that. But some old Wall Street stalwart, his identity lost to us, known only to the ages, said another true thing:
"Bulls make money; bear make money; but hogs get slaughtered."
Here endeth the lesson.