Originally Posted by
percysmith
If your costs raise above $2/gal you'd be a fool to sell it at $2/gal.
If the cost exceeds the optimum price of $2, you're screwed either way. You can decide if you want to lose 4 figures that day, or raise the price above optimum and lose 5 figures that day instead. If you can yield a profit at a higher price, then your hypothetical case has a different optimum price than you thought. If the optimum price is less than the cost, it may be better to close the shop that day, and lose only some reputation for being reliable.
Instead of inventing obscure situations, who's to say that the suppliers prices are above $2 anyway? The retail market and wholesale market are different markets. The retailer selling fuel for $2/gal could have a cheaper supplier than the competition, or they could be manufacturing their own product. My premise did not impose any particular cause for the price difference -- nor need it. My premise doesn't require all retailers to have the same source, and also have the same price at that source. Even if they have the same source, price can still differ if volume differs.
Originally Posted by
percysmith
Credit card fraud cost is just as unavoidable as crude oil price increases
If you believe that, then you have no reason to advocate for a pricier payment system because your premise in this case prevents you from having a cost-saving investment in another payment system.
Originally Posted by
percysmith
- unless you (as one merchant) stop taking cards altogether (but you lose customers as a result)
Indeed. If you want to advocate something that is less vulnerable to fraud, cash-only would do that because risk of counterfeit bills is much less. Cost is lower, but market share is negatively influenced by the lack of payment acceptance. It's common in Europe for small retailers to take the cash-only route to reduce cost.
Originally Posted by
percysmith
You cannot use a card's magstripe for processing transactions when the card has a chip and the POS terminal can also take chip. At least, for local transactions, your security is enhanced.
Indeed, but now you're talking something different than jeffjaguar, who proposed following a waitress to the terminal to witness the swiping action. What you describe is not merely portability, but rather a combination of changes that would likely enhance security (if implemented correctly).
Although what you propose still leaves room for debate because it replaces old vulnerabilities with new ones, and we're speculating that the new ones are lesser. Moreover, the skimming vulnerability is only countered if the insertion only penetrates the device enough to read the chip (if it were to take the full length of the card, the magstripe could still be skimmed while the chip is accessed). And such an attempt at an old exploit would generally work because consumers don't think that critically enough to notice.
Even more secure yet would be to use a wired terminal to process a pure EMV card (that is, with no magstripe on the card). And it would impose no critical thinking or street wisdom on the consumer.