Quote:
Originally Posted by MMM
Thank you, Nyororin. I was trying to figure out why there would be shortages where things should be in plentiful supply. I didn't consider the hoarding factor.
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Imagine all the おばさん who buy 10 packs of something because the saw something on the news say it was healthy, and who will buy and extra 5 packs of something they`ll never use just because it is on sale... being told by media rumors that they might not be able to buy any at ALL if they don`t run out and buy it RIGHT NOW!!!!!!
And imagine that on a Tokyo-wide scale.
That is pretty much what is at the root of the shortages, from what I understand. They all ran out RIGHT NOW!!! and bought up all they could find, making a real shortage. So everyone else who wouldn`t normally hoard without a really good reason has kind of been pushed into it.
The amount of negativity I have seen being expressed toward the people who are running around to get around the gas rationing (after filling 3 or 4 poly tanks with gas before the rationing, CAUSING the rationing to begin with) and the older women who are buying up toilet paper by the pallet has been pretty impressive.
I`m finding the whole toilet paper thing fascinating, as it is stemming from the memories of the shortage in the 1973 oil crisis thing... which was also not a REAL shortage, but a hoarding issue. However, in people`s minds, "gasoline shortage" is linked to a lack of toilet paper - even if there is no real "gasoline shortage", and the last case didn`t have an effect on toilet paper production - just triggered rumors that caused a mass hoarding event...