My name is Sigmund and I’m a capitalist. I believe in the Invisible Hand and all the dictates of supply and demand in the realm of MTG finance. This means I embrace all the positives – and inevitable negatives – of such a system.

I’ve been hearing many disgruntled voices lately berating one body of people or another for their business practices. Wizards of the Coast is executing sets poorly by mismanaging print runs and introducing new “rarities” via Expeditions. Local game stores are unfairly price gouging on new products when they receive less supply than anticipated. Even Hasbro cannot escape the pitchforks, receiving blame for manipulating Wizards and poorly executing an online gaming platform.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and I’m not going to sit here and decry that everyone needs to embrace capitalism as I have. But everyone should at least be aware of the underlying drivers that have gotten us into certain pricing situations. And if you take away nothing from this article but one thing, I hope that one thing is simply that there isn’t a single body to blame for certain pricing behaviors. Oh, and you may learn a thing or two about MTG economics along the way.

Ready for another off-the-beaten-path type of finance column? Here we go!

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