Basically, books must be the same price *everywhere*. The law is there to prevent large discount stores (Leclerc & Carrefour here, Wal-Mart & co in the US) from driving the smaller book stores out of business by dumping books at ultra low-prices.
I can see why this is contrary to your idea of a free market. Basically what we are saying is that books aren't ordinary goods. They're at the core of that thing called "culture", and as such, they can't be discounted. The bet here being that you're far more likely to pick up a quality book at your local bookstore than in the supermarket (they usually just stock the best-sellers... that make most of the money.) By keeping bookstore owners afloat, you help diversity, and in the end consumers, who always benefit from diversity.
I'm not saying this is working exceptionally well, but when there's a law to protect the little guys and not the corporations, you keep it. I haven't RTFA, but if Amazon really is discounting books, they'll have to stop. US corporations must adapt to the country they're doing business in. If you can't endure the laws, don't do business there. (And doing that in China might just be the right thing to do...)
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Basically, books must be the same price *everywhere*. The law is there to prevent large discount stores (Leclerc & Carrefour here, Wal-Mart & co in the US) from driving the smaller book stores out of business by dumping books at ultra low-prices.
I can see why this is contrary to your idea of a free market. Basically what we are saying is that books aren't ordinary goods. They're at the core of that thing called "culture", and as such, they can't be discounted. The bet here being that you're far more likely to pick up a quality book at your local bookstore than in the supermarket (they usually just stock the best-sellers... that make most of the money.) By keeping bookstore owners afloat, you help diversity, and in the end consumers, who always benefit from diversity.
I'm not saying this is working exceptionally well, but when there's a law to protect the little guys and not the corporations, you keep it. I haven't RTFA, but if Amazon really is discounting books, they'll have to stop. US corporations must adapt to the country they're doing business in. If you can't endure the laws, don't do business there. (And doing that in China might just be the right thing to do...)