Other than governments’ willingness to pay, I think another important factor here is the popular stance that it would be immoral for manufacturers to sell respirators at a price that is substantially above marginal cost (regardless of market price). Maybe if manufacturers were “allowed” to sell respirators for $3 (without a major PR/regulatory risk) their marginal profit would be x20 larger than normal, and would draw major investments and efforts into manufacturing respirators.
[EDIT: In support of this, consider the following (from 3M’s website, dated 2020-03-31): “3M has not changed the prices we charge for 3M respirators as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak.”]
It is now 7 months later, and you still generally cannot buy N-95 masks.
I’m not sure what you mean by “cannot buy”. The question is at what price it is feasible to buy good respirators. (I think at ~8-11 USD per respirator it’s probably possible to buy good respirators, at least in the US and Israel).
What I had in mind with this policy was that the government would contract directly with producers (using the defense production act where necessary) to procure enough N-95 respirators for everyone in the country, and the government would then distribute them to everyone. There would be some agreed upon price of procurement between the government and manufacturers that would be negotiated at the start of the process. If manufacturers want to produce more respirators than what they contracted for, they are welcome to do that and to sell it at a price they choose.
What I mean by cannot buy is that N-95s are unavailable to nearly all people who may want to purchase them https://twitter.com/davidrliu/status/1319980228765274112?s=20. I’ve looked online throughout the pandemic, and they are usually unavailable for purchase. Sometimes, you can add them to your cart, but then you can’t check out because you get a warning that they are being prioritized for frontline workers (that screenshot above is me doing exactly that). Sometimes, you can buy more heavy duty P100 respirators that have traditionally been used for doing something like spray painting, but a lot of people prefer not to wear those regularly because they are more bulky.
I agree that the issue I raised does not interfere with this proposed intervention (sorry for not making this clear).
Re availability, googling for the term [buy n95 masks] gives some relevant pointers within the first 2 result pages. There are probably many counterfeit respirators out there and these sellers don’t seem well-known, but one may still want to bet on them if the manufacturer’s website offers a way to authenticate the validity of some unique ids on the respirators etc. (3M has something like this). Note: I’m not recommending the above google search as a way to buy respirators; people may have better alternatives depending on where they live (e.g. in Israel one can buy n95 respirators from a well-known retailer).
Other than governments’ willingness to pay, I think another important factor here is the popular stance that it would be immoral for manufacturers to sell respirators at a price that is substantially above marginal cost (regardless of market price). Maybe if manufacturers were “allowed” to sell respirators for $3 (without a major PR/regulatory risk) their marginal profit would be x20 larger than normal, and would draw major investments and efforts into manufacturing respirators.
[EDIT: In support of this, consider the following (from 3M’s website, dated 2020-03-31): “3M has not changed the prices we charge for 3M respirators as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak.”]
I’m not sure what you mean by “cannot buy”. The question is at what price it is feasible to buy good respirators. (I think at ~8-11 USD per respirator it’s probably possible to buy good respirators, at least in the US and Israel).
What I had in mind with this policy was that the government would contract directly with producers (using the defense production act where necessary) to procure enough N-95 respirators for everyone in the country, and the government would then distribute them to everyone. There would be some agreed upon price of procurement between the government and manufacturers that would be negotiated at the start of the process. If manufacturers want to produce more respirators than what they contracted for, they are welcome to do that and to sell it at a price they choose.
What I mean by cannot buy is that N-95s are unavailable to nearly all people who may want to purchase them https://twitter.com/davidrliu/status/1319980228765274112?s=20. I’ve looked online throughout the pandemic, and they are usually unavailable for purchase. Sometimes, you can add them to your cart, but then you can’t check out because you get a warning that they are being prioritized for frontline workers (that screenshot above is me doing exactly that). Sometimes, you can buy more heavy duty P100 respirators that have traditionally been used for doing something like spray painting, but a lot of people prefer not to wear those regularly because they are more bulky.
I agree that the issue I raised does not interfere with this proposed intervention (sorry for not making this clear).
Re availability, googling for the term [buy n95 masks] gives some relevant pointers within the first 2 result pages. There are probably many counterfeit respirators out there and these sellers don’t seem well-known, but one may still want to bet on them if the manufacturer’s website offers a way to authenticate the validity of some unique ids on the respirators etc. (3M has something like this). Note: I’m not recommending the above google search as a way to buy respirators; people may have better alternatives depending on where they live (e.g. in Israel one can buy n95 respirators from a well-known retailer).