Tonight I spotted an article on the website for The Washington Post which had to do with the black market for organs. The article shows that scarcity and strict government regulations for obtaining organs has led to a large black market for organs. The article, “Organ Market” (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/13/AR2007041302066.html) discusses that the black market thrives because of the excess of organ demands. According to the author, the only way to put an end to the black market is to simply flood the market with organs in order to drive down the price for organs, which would make the exchange of organs much less appealing because of the higher transaction costs relative to its profitability. I found this article to be interesting since my group will be discussing black markets as it relates to exchange rates.
April 25, 2007 at 2:32 am |
So which is worse? Black market trade for blood diamonds or bloody organs?
April 25, 2007 at 2:47 am |
Interesting question you raise. One is used to finance an insurgency and oftentimes mined in those war zones, but the other black market good, that is the bloody organ, probably goes to the highest bidder…oftentimes the wealthiest. Perhaps people were killed just to obtain their healthy organs for the black market. I know I didn’t answer the question, but I don’t think there is an answer. If there were a simple solution, then black markets would probably not exist in the same fashion as today because there could be less captial restraints put on various countries for different goods.