Yeah you’re right, that’s fair. I just think people don’t behave that rationally. I’m not moving away from my kid’s grandparents because my local costs have gone up, for example.

There exists greater friction with many of the items in red than the highly automated ones.

My question is how linked is this friction to the lack of automation?

With text books and meat packing there are few players due to consolidation. This means they can avoid investing in automation and keep prices high because they face less resistance from consumers and virtually none from competitors.

In short I’m asking if market forces are to blame for lower automation. And therefore automation is not the root cause of price increases.

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zeroonetwothree a day ago | parent | next [-]

At some price level you would move. Of course there are probably many more people that would move before you so that situation may not arise in practice. Economics works on the margin.

	▲	adam_patarino a day ago \| parent [-]
		Sure but there’s a significant change in price that I can withstand before moving. My point is there’s less price sensitivity for some of these items. And because of that I wonder if that affects the amount of automation suppliers invest in.

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jdasdf a day ago | parent | prev [-]

>I’m not moving away from my kid’s grandparents because my local costs have gone up, for example.

If you're unable to eat because you spent all your resources paying for that residence near the grandparents you would certainly move.