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bit1993today at 8:20 AM2 repliesview on HN

This is like responding to symptoms and not addressing the root cause. This is something that should be fixed by supply and demand, buyers should have a choice where to buy and sellers should have a choice how to price their products.

These problems arise when dealing with a monopoly, that undermines the free market and that's a far worse systemic problem and the root cause of these issues. AI has nothing to do with it.


Replies

cowanon77today at 8:33 AM

There is an imbalance in leverage and timing though. Dynamic pricing requires a lot of real time and historical data; companies can access and share that information easily, and you as a consumer cannot.

Even in areas with multiple competitors, they can (and do) effectively collude by getting their information through data brokers and third parties.

I don't have a solution, but we are currently very far away from a free market in general.

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bkotoday at 10:56 AM

There is no monopoly. Grocers are incredibly competitive and have low single digit margins (~1-3%)

There are things you can do to lower prices like prosecuting theft. In this case technology is part of the solution. Adding red tape and restricting technology will do the opposite.