By Walter E. Williams
Human Events Online, 30th May 2006
Say you owned a small 10-pound inventory of coffee that you purchased
for $3 a pound. Each week you'd sell me a pound for $3.25. Suppose a
freeze in Brazil destroyed half of its coffee crop, causing the world
price of coffee to immediately rise to $5 a pound. You still have
coffee that you purchased before the jump in prices. When I stop by to
buy another pound of coffee from you, how much will you charge me? I'm
betting that you're going to charge me at least $5 a pound. Why?
Because that's today's cost to replace your inventory.
Historical costs do not determine prices; what economists call opportunity costs do.
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